^^RY  OF  PRI/Vcoi 


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tOGfCAL  SE^\' 


JOHN   FOURTEEN 


JOHN    FOURTEEN 


THE  GREATEST  CHAPTER 

OF  THE  GREATEST  BOOK  /^ 


00")  29  192S 

'Logical  %^^^- 


XBY 

JAMES  H.  DUNHAM,  Ph.D. 

Dean  of  College  of  Liberal  Arts  and  Sciences 
of  Temple  University 


Ne-w  Yohk 


Chicago 


Toronto 


Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 


LOMDOK 


AMD  EdINBUROH 


Copyright,  1917,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago:  17  N.  Wabash  Ave. 
Toronto :  25  Richmond  St.,  W. 
London:  21  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh:    100    Princes    Street 


PREFACE 

THE  aim  of  this  book  is  twofold ;  first  to  present 
in  conspective  form  the  spiritual  principles 
developed  by  Jesus  in  what  many  readers  regard 
as  the  most  impressive  of  His  discourses ;  and  secondly 
to  interpret  these  principles  so  far  as  convenient  under 
the  shadow  of  the  method  made  familiar  by  the  inquir- 
ies of  modern  psychology.  That  a  work  of  this  kind 
might  meet  a  need  as  yet  unfilled  became  evident  to 
the  writer  the  moment  he  set  himself  to  the  systematic 
study  of  the  Chapter  with  a  view  to  public  exposition. 
Valuable  homiletic  helps,  critical  vignettes  of  rare 
insight,  representing  every  conceivable  type  of  mind, 
careful  historical  estimates,  occasional  sermons  of 
great  fascination  abound  on  every  hand  and  are  sup- 
plemented by  the  religious  zeal  of  every  generation. 
No  preacher  or  teacher  or  quiet  student  of  the  verses 
can  go  to  his  task  without  them.  They  give  the  drift 
of  feeling,  the  divisional  points  which  the  Speaker 
emphasized  in  His  farewell  appeal.  But  they  do  not 
pretend  to  exhaust  the  rich  lode  of  truth  here  con- 
cealed. The  claim  is  made  that  a  sustained  treatment 
of  the  dominant  theme  in  the  Chapter  calls  for  a 
volume  complete  in  itself.  Dr.  Bernard  in  his  "  Cen- 
tral Teaching  of  Jesus  Christ "  massed  the  valedictory 
addresses  and  prayers  in  one  continuous  studj-.  His 
book  has  never  failed  of  readers.  It  is  the  author's 
hope  that  the  present  volume,  constructed  in  part  for 
those  who  sat  in  person  before  him,  in  part  for  an 
audience  which  only  the  imagination  could  descry, 
may  serve  in  some  measure  to  do  for  a  single  group 

6 


6  PREFACE 

of  verses  what  the  other  did  effectively  for  a  larger 
passage — exalt  and  clarify  the  words  of  the  divine 
Preacher. 

The  first  aim  was  as  to  form,  the  second  concerns 
content.  It  is  not  for  a  moment  suggested  that 
students  of  St.  John's  Gospel  have  not  been  men  of 
expert  method.  Robertson  of  Brighton,  a  name,  says 
Matthew  Arnold,  which  we  are  bound  always  to  men- 
tion with  respect,  has  passed  the  spell  of  his  analytic 
genius  over  its  concepts  and  characters,  and  made 
obscure  facts  leap  to  new  meaning  before  our  eyes. 
Psychology  was  a  real  and  conscious  instrument  in  his 
hands  even  before  its  new  technique  was  born.  In  a 
homelier  way,  perhaps  without  appreciating  the  trend 
of  contemporary  science,  Marcus  Dods  grappled  with 
the  problem  of  personality  and  did  his  bit  towards  its 
solution.  This  problem  emerges  in  every  section  of 
the  current  work  because  it  is  the  supreme  subject  of 
the  Lord's  discourse.  Fundamental  impulses,  the 
value  and  insidious  charm  of  the  sensory  image,  the 
various  aspects  of  association,  the  play  of  memory, 
the  forming  of  judgment,  the  sense  of  order,  the 
ebulition  of  feeling,  the  power  of  will,  the  autocracy 
of  Self — these  flash  in  ever-changing  figures  before  be- 
wildered observers,  as  Jesus  pictures  eternal  Man- 
hood, first  in  His  own  Person  and  then  in  the  lives  of 
His  emulators.  "  He  knew  what  was  in  man."  To 
react  to  the  deeper  symbolism  of  His  words  we  must 
penetrate  the  secrecies  of  the  common  mind.  Psy- 
chology has  opened  the  gate.  Therefore  the  formulas 
of  this  science,  now  the  property  of  students  in  every 
field,  may  with  right  be  summoned  to  explain  the 
issues  of  the  Chapter.  J   H   D 

Philadelphia,  Pa. 


CONTENTS 


I. 
11. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 

VII. 

VIII. 

IX. 

X. 

XI. 

XII. 

XIII. 

XIV. 

XV. 

XVI. 

XVII. 

XVIII. 


The  Stethoscope  of  Faith 

The  Way  Not  the  Goal,  the  Object 
OP  Quest 

Spiritual   Moulds     .... 

The  Duplicate  Vision     . 

The  Genesis  of  Truth     . 

The  Last  Resort  of  Faith 

The  Servant  Surpassing  His  Lord 

The  Magic  of  a  Name 

The  Divine  Attorney 

The    Ineptitude    of   the    World    for 
Spiritual  Truth    .... 


Life  Not  Original  With  Man     . 

Love  in  the  Crucible 

The  Problem  of  the  Incarnation 

A  Legitimate  Corporation 

The  Divinity  of  the  Scriptures  . 

The  Pedagogic  Office  of  the  Spirit 

Pax  Christi 

The  Creed  of  the  Cross  . 


9 

25 

39 

56 

71 

87 

103 

120 

137 

154: 

170 
185 
201 
220 
238 
259 
279 
302 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH 

John  14:1.  "Let  not  your  heart  he 
troubled;  ye  believe  in  Ood,  believe  also 
in  me." 

THE  name  of  Dr.  Laennec  is  one  of  the  most  honor- 
able in  modern  science.  It  was  he  who  made  it 
possible  for  the  medical  practitioner  to  explore 
the  innermost  recesses  of  the  human  heart.  By  an 
invention,  which  now  seems  extremely  simple,  he  in- 
creased the  hearing  capacity  of  the  ear,  and  made  it 
sensitive  to  the  slightest  change  in  the  usual  motions  of 
the  heart.  The  Stethoscope  is  an  instrument  for  noting 
the  activity  of  the  central  organ  of  our  body.  It  dis- 
covers what  the  eye  cannot  see  or  the  hand  touch  or  the 
unaided  ear  detect.  It  has  saved  many  a  life,  pro- 
longed many  another,  and  been  a  distinct  boon  to  the 
world.    We  give  our  tribute  of  praise  to  his  ingenuity. 

There  is  another  Name  greater  than  his;  and  an- 
other discovery  laden  with  infinitely  greater  signifi- 
cance. There  is  One  who  has  laid  His  divine  Ear 
upon  the  troubled  heart  of  men.  He  has  used  no 
mechanical  instrument  to  learn  its  hidden  symptoms; 
He  has  pierced  the  soul  with  no  electric  ray. 

In  syllables  of  exquisite  love  the  infallible  Physician 
prescribes  for  diseased  and  decrepit  spirits.  To  cred- 
ulous races  that  have  spent  their  treasures  in  quest 
of  a  fabulous  cure,  to  scientific  genius  that  offers  its 

9 


10  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

naive  logic  to  heal  the  bleeding  wounds  of  hate  or 
ignorance,  Jesus  Christ  speaks  the  tender  and  gra- 
cious words,  "  Let  not  your  heart  be  troubled ;  ye 
believe  in  God,  believe  also  in  me." 


There  is  a  fatal  malady  that  the  world  suffers  from 
and  Jesus  stands  ready  to  analyze  it.  I  do  not  ask  you 
to  debate  the  matter  of  sin.  I  do  not  ask  that  you 
should  be  able  to  define  its  precise  meaning  or  influ- 
ence. I  am  only  asking  that  you  admit  the  fact  and 
place  of  moral  disturbance.  That  is  enough  for  the 
present. 

But  that  admitted,  it  is  at  once  evident  that  the 
trouble  must  be  localized.  No  medical  man  can  pre- 
scribe for  a  disease  till  he  knows  what  its  nature  is. 
He  seeks  for  its  exact  location.  Is  it  in  the  brain?  is  it 
a  question  of  nerves?  is  a  vital  organ  affected?  Let 
him  find  that  out  first ;  and  then  he  is  ready  for  a  cure. 
It  is  precisely  this  skill  that  commends  the  Saviour 
to  us  as  a  competent  Healer.  He  proceeded  on  this  plan, 
when  He  relieved  the  ailments  of  body.  He  was  careful 
to  ask,  "What  wilt  thou  that  I  should  do  unto  thee?" 
H  adopted  this  course  in  seeking  to  give  spiritual  help. 
What  was  the  trouble  with  the  young  Ruler  who  came 
with  every  protestation  of  personal  homage?  Discover 
tLat  first,  and  then  apply  the  remedy.  The  trouble 
there  was  not  that  he  had  transgressed  the  moral  code. 
His  outward  conduct  was  impeccable.  He  had  not  a 
single  stain  on  his  garments.  The  trouble  lay  deeper, 
and  Jesus  probed  to  its  core.  This  young  man  was 
enamored  of  his  gold  and  could  not  part  with  it,  save 
by  tearing  out  his  heart.  Jesus  put  His  finger  on  the 
wound. 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  11 

He  had  about  Him  now  the  eleven  disciples;  the 
night  was  dark,  and  their  spirits  were  shrouded  in 
denser  darkness.  You  can  feel  the  vibrant  air  of  the 
upper  chamber.  You  can  see  the  moving  of  an  uncanny 
feeling  on  their  countenances.  Every  word  spoke  out 
the  strange  and  unwonted  sorrow  that  oppressed  them. 
Jesus  localized  the  trouble;  Jesus  revealed  the  seat  of 
the  new  difficulty.  And  what  an  immense  advantage  is 
gained  when  you  know  where  the  trouble  is !  It  is  no 
longer  fighting  in  the  dark ;  it  is  no  longer  a  campaign 
against  a  hidden  or  misunderstood  enemy.  Jesus  tells 
us  where  the  malady  lies.  It  is  His  duty  as  an  experi- 
enced Physician  of  souls  to  awake  us  from  the  security 
of  a  sense  of  general  debility,  and  center  our  thought 
on  the  immediate  and  alarming  nature  of  the  trouble. 

Jesus  has  no  hesitation  in  saying,  it  is  an  affected 
heart !  I  sometimes  wish  that  men  could  be  driven  from 
their  spiritual  lethargy  as  easily  as  a  man  is  from  his 
conviction  of  health,  when  you  tell  him  his  heart  is 
organically  wrong.  But  you  may  rehearse  the  symp- 
toms of  the  spiritual  disease  in  their  ears  till  dooms- 
day ;  you  may  let  them  listen  through  the  stethoscope  of 
Revelation  without  getting  from  them  a  single  quiver 
of  regard.  They  claim  to  be  right;  they  claim  to  have 
no  trouble  beyond  what  the  general  run  of  the  world's 
citizens  possesses ;  they  don't  want  to  know  the  details, 
and  they  spurn  the  offered  remedy.  But  Jesus  gives  us 
to  understand  that  it  is  an  affected  heart  that  troubles 
us.    And  may  we  well  pay  attention  to  His  words. 

I  bid  you  observe,  it  is  not  an  affected  mind;  that  is, 
the  ability  to  think  out  and  decide  a  proposition  is  not 
impaired.  If  it  were  that  and  nothing  else  I  appre- 
hend that  God  would  not  have  sent  His  Son  to  bleed 
out  His  life  on  an  accursed  cross.    The  hemlock  would 


V, 


12  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

be  a  suflScient  protest  against  the  folly  of  earth;  you 
wouldn't  need  the  precious  blood  of  the  divine  Lord. 
When  it  comes  to  intellectual  questions  that  are  bound 
to  agitate  the  mind,  no  specific  is  needed.  You  know 
how  you  settle  a  knotty  question.  You  affirm  that 
you  have  done  the  best  you  could  under  the  circum- 
stances, and  the  most  erudite  philosopher  could  not  do 
more.  And  there  the  matter  rests.  Or,  you  reason  that 
man  can  never  expect  to  grow  into  moral  perfection  or 
lay  his  hand  on  the  complete  treasury  of  knowledge. 
His  limitations  forbid.  Hence,  what  is  the  need  of 
worrying  about  it?  Will  you  divert  the  course  of 
Halley's  comet  by  being  anxious  lest  it  crash  with 
destructive  power  upon  the  earth?  These  things  are 
above  and  beyond  our  sphere;  let  us  push  aside  any 
consideration  of  them.  Jesus  did  not  speak  of  the 
troubles  of  mind. 

Again,  Jesus  did  not  localize  the  trouble  in  con- 
science. I  presume,  if  we  had  had  anything  to  do  with 
the  men  of  Galilee  in  that  hour  we  should  have  shamed 
them  by  an  anticipation  of  their  brutal  disloyalty  to  the 
Lord  in  His  time  of  need.  But  though  Jesus  foresaw 
that  He  did  not  taunt  them  with  it ;  nor  did  He  argue 
with  them  as  to  the  right  and  wrong  of  it,  and  the 
inerasable  scorch  it  would  leave  on  their  consciences. 
Paul  had  a  good  deal  to  say  about  the  moral  sense 
which  we  call  conscience.  But  Jesus  passes  it  by ;  He 
knew  how  easily  the  will  gets  paralyzed  and  the  motives 
checked ;  and  He  knew  that  they  could  not  break  that 
paralysis,  so  long  as  the  more  fundamental  organ  was 
inert. 

People  talk  a  good  deal  now  about  their  conscience ; 
as  to  whether  their  conscience  will  let  them  do  this  or 
that,  read  certain  books,  take  an  excursion  on  the  Lord's 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  13 

Day,  play  a  certain  game,  be  interested  in  customary 
social  amusements.  Conscience  is  a  whirlpool  of  con- 
flicting emotions,  and  many  are  swamped  in  its  turbid 
waters,  when  by  going  further  on  they  might  have 
struck  the  fair  current  of  an  untroubled  life.  The 
man  who  stops  to  decide  the  equity  of  specific  points  in 
conduct  and  is  content  to  remain  there  will  arrive  at 
no  appreciative  idea  of  the  Lord's  diagnosis. 

Jesus  did  not  find  the  seat  of  trouble  in  conscience ; 
He  went  down  to  the  heart.  "  Let  not  your  heart  be 
troubled  " — words  of  classic  charm,  words  of  insinuat- 
ing grace,  words  of  satisfying  peace!  Why  did  He 
select  the  organic  term  ?  Because  it  bore  the  ancestral 
approval  of  His  race?  Because  prophet  and  priest  had 
made  it  the  exclusive  medium  of  a  man's  relation  with 
God  ?  That  is  indeed  a  fact : — "  Keep  thy  heart  with 
all  diligence,"  says  the  wise  man,  "  for  out  of  it  are 
the  issues  of  life."  That  is  to  say,  if  you  keep  the 
fibers  strong,  the  beat  true  and  the  movement  un- 
altered, you  will  lead  a  good  life.  But  that  is  not  the 
prime  reason  for  His  use  of  it.  He  knew  that  not  rea- 
son, not  abstract  right,  but  a  soul's  affection  for  its 
God  was  the  keynote  of  religion.  He  knew  that  you 
have  to  create  love  in  the  heart  in  order  to  get  suitable 
action.  And  the  heart  has  always  been  the  unques- 
tioned and  dominating  seat  of  love.  Hence  He  went 
down  to  the  h^art. 

We  have  no  better  message  for  a  somewhat  senti- 
mental age  like  ours  than  this : — Look  to  the  ambitions 
that  prompt,  to  the  desires  that  goad,  and  you  will  get 
a  true  picture  of  the  man.  There  is  the  root  of  trouble 
and  there  the  medicine  must  be  applied.  What  are 
you  interested  in?  What  would  you  sacrifice  time  and 
even  life  for?    That  is  the  true  index  of  the  heart. ' 


14  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

As  a  sovereign  Student  of  human  nature  no  one  ever 
matched  the  lowly  Man  of  Nazareth.  As  an  analyst  of 
motive,  able  to  assay  with  unerring  accuracy  the 
simplest  reactions  of  men's  minds,  He  stands  supreme 
among  the  spiritual  experimenters  of  the  race. 

II 

But  Jesus  not  only  localized  the  trouble,  He 
diagnosed  it.  The  first  step  in  the  cure  is  to  find 
exactly  what  the  symptoms  are.  The  skilled  prac- 
titioner will  determine  at  once  whether  the  dis- 
ease be  functional  or  organic;  that  is,  if  the  heart  is 
played  on  in  sympathy  with  other  organs,  or  if  it  has 
some  distinct  weakness  of  its  own.  The  former  may  be 
disconcerting  though  not  dangerous ;  the  latter  requires 
instant  attention.  It  is  because  the  body's  life  is  de- 
pendent on  the  action  of  the  heart  that  Jesus  seizes  on 
it  as  a  symbol  of  spiritual  character.  He  looks  into 
the  soul  and  discovers  a  serious  disturbance.  The  term 
used  is  strong.  The  turbulent  violence  of  the  sea  is 
described  by  the  same  word ;  the  quaking  of  one's  frame 
in  face  of  some  dreadful  disaster  is  given  utterance 
in  the  same  way.  We  must  not  blink  the  fact  that  a 
serious  decadence  is  manifest  in  our  moral  tissues. 
What  is  its  cause?  Let  us  probe  into  the  secret  oper- 
ations and  read  the  symptoms. 

The  Saviour  speaks  of  some  overpowering  dread. 
The  disciples  faced  it,  that  night  in  the  fateful  room. 
Some  unexpected  and  inexplicable  calamity  hung  over 
them.  It  was  a  weird  specter  with  shadowed  face  and 
clenched  hands.  It  threatened  their  beloved  Master 
and  hence  themselves.  His  heart  was  at  rest;  but 
theirs  were  full  of  tempest.  They  could  hardly  await 
its  coming  and  yet  feared  to  see  its  real  form  un- 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  15 

veiled.  This  is  one  of  the  harshest,  bitterest  feelings 
known  to  the  soul  of  man.  How  often  have  nations 
sat  under  its  spell!  I  fancy  that  the  French  people 
sank  into  an  oblivious  stupor  as  the  shades  of  St. 
Bartholomew's  Eve  spread  over  the  city.  What  was 
lurking  on  the  horizon  ?  Was  it  death  to  the  kingdom, 
or  annihilation  to  the  hated  Huguenots?  The 
soul  must  be  of  iron  and  the  blood  of  the  consist- 
ency of  ice  to  pass  unscathed  through  such  terrible 
scenes. 

The  same  malignant  touch  of  dread  rests  on  men's 
hearts,  when  fortunes  are  seen  to  be  crumbling  into 
dust  beneath  the  stroke  of  some  financial  crisis.  Many 
are  still  living  who  remember  the  Panic  of  '73,  when 
on  Black  Friday  the  climax  came  and  noted  business 
houses  crashed  into  ruin,  and  the  nation's  credit  was 
almost  overthrown.  It  was  an  hour  to  try  men's  souls ; 
it  was  a  time  to  test  the  financial  policies  of  the 
country;  it  was  a  moment  to  turn  men's  thought  from 
the  failing  things  of  sense  to  the  realities  of  an  eternal 
truth. 

A  similar  dread,  quiet  in  manner,  yet  deep  in  its 
impressiveness,  pervades  the  hearts  of  the  watchers  by 
the  bedside  of  a  dying  father.  Have  you  waited  thus, 
noting  each  gasp,  sympathetic  with  each  evidence  of 
pain,  desiring  the  end  so  that  rest  might  come,  and  yet 
realizing  what  your  loss  is  to  be?  That  is  trouble, 
when  the  heart  moans  out  its  pain.  That  is  the  very 
agony  that  Jesus  passed  through  on  the  road  to  the 
tomb  of  Lazarus ;  for  it  is  written :  "  He  groaned  in 
spirit,  and  was  troubled."  Even  the  holy,  compassion- 
ate Lord  knew  the  anguish  of  human  sorrow.  But 
what  must  be  the  appalling  dread  to  him  who  looks  for 
himself  into  the  future  and  sees  no  hope?    Every  true 


16  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

man  gets  some  sense  of  it  here.  These  unanswered 
questions,  these  hard  problems,  these  unexpiated  sins! 
— what  shall  I  do  with  them?  What  are  you  doing 
with  them?  Then,  the  look  into  the  unopened  future, 
years  and  cycles  of  years,  unending  ages,  beyond  this 
world,  in  a  world,  that  must  be  either  the  apotheosis 
of  beauty  or  the  azimuth  of  misery!  How  can  I  meet 
such  uncertainty?  This  is  dread  without  measure; 
this  is  dread,  such  as  not  even  the  personal  with- 
drawal of  the  Master  could  suggest.  This  is  life  in  its 
fullness  or  death  in  its  bitter  curse.  I  do  not  wonder 
that  unsteady  souls  have  staggered  unprepared  into 
the  curtained  dark  and  disappeared. 

Such  was  the  first  element  in  the  disciples'  sorrow. 
There  was  another,  to  them  beginning  to  be  real;  to 
many  a  weary,  defeated  spirit  only  too  familiar  a 
companion.  I  mean  the  sense  of  loneliness.  They 
had  clung  to  Christ,  depended  on  Him,  walked  by  His 
directing  hand.  They  had  lived  those  three  years  as 
though  He  was  always  to  be  visually  before  them. 
And  now  He  was  about  to  disappear.  Their  sodden 
minds  at  last  took  that  in.  They  would  not  have  Him 
for  their  Guide.  If  you  could  gather  up  the  bitterest 
drops  that  fall  from  humanity's  cup,  I  think  you  would 
find  them  composed  for  the  most  part  of  the  sorrows  of 
isolation.  We  are  alone — how  many  persons  are  alone ! 
— misunderstood,  ridiculed,  or  just  left  severely  to 
their  own  company.  You  may  lay  your  best  friend  in 
the  tomb  and  think  over  his  benefactions  to  you,  his 
ardent  love,  his  warm  appreciation,  his  unstinted  sym- 
pathy ;  and  that  consoles  for  a  moment.  But  when  you 
return  to  your  home  and  hear  no  voice  that  calls  you, 
see  no  face  that  smiles  into  yours,  touch  no  hand,  once 
vibrant  with  affection,  then,  oh,  then  you  exclaim: — 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  17 

"The  stately  ships  go  on, 

To  their  haven  under  the  hill; 
But  oh!  for  the  touch  of  a  vanished  hand, 
And  the  sound  of  a  voice  that  is  still!  " 

But  keen  and  biting  as  that  loneliness  is  I  fancy  it 
is  surpassed  by  another, — when  a  young  man  leaves 
the  ancestral  roof  and  goes  out  to  make  his  way  in 
the  world.  He  is  immersed,  lost,  absorbed  in  the  busi- 
ness of  the  city;  his  days  come  and  go  with  unregis- 
tered rapidity;  while  back  in  the  country  alone  and 
unnoticed  sit  the  aged  parents  who  had  spent  their 
all  for  him.  What  would  they  give  for  a  few  words 
from  his  beloved  hand ;  what  joy  the  simple  card  from 
him  would  impart !  But  they  are  left  alone  by  the  old 
hearthstone,  in  the  old  house  where  memory  is  vivid 
and  affection  keen.  Yet  what  are  these  to  the  embrace 
of  the  strong  arms  which  in  childhood  were  thrown  so 
lovingly  about  their  neck?  My  friend,  if  you  have  a 
father  or  mother  whose  life  is  at  its  setting,  let  not 
this  night's  shadows  close  ere  you  send  the  word  of 
love  to  aching  hearts. 

That  is  the  bitterness  of  being  alone.  It  is  enough. 
Yet  there  is  another  sort  more  desperate  than  it.  This 
steeps  the  heart  in  trouble  that  is  harder  to  remove. 
This  deals  not  in  present  but  future  significances.  It 
comes  to  expression  when  a  man  realizes  that  he  can- 
not change  the  fiber  of  his  heart.  It  states  its  case 
when  the  heathen  pilgrim  seeks  release  from  the  load 
of  sin  by  every  conceivable  device  of  penance.  At  that 
moment  a  man  understands  that  he  is  alone.  His 
friends  cannot  support  him.  His  spiritual  adviser  is 
helpless.  His  boasted  religion  is  a  farce.  His  cold, 
correct  moral  life  is  a  marble  tablet  to  inefficiency. 
That  penitent  on  India's  burning  sands — have  you  seen 


18  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

him?  He  measures  his  length  across  the  province  that 
he  may  climb  the  sacred  hill  and  stand  to  his  neck  in 
the  cold  waters  on  its  summit.  And  then,  forsooth, 
says  the  priest,  his  sins  are  forgiven!  But  God  pro- 
vides otherwise;  He  reveals  another  Mt.  Moriah  for 
bound  and  smitten  Isaac.  The  Christian  missionary 
falls  into  converse  with  the  pilgrim,  learns  his  tale,  his 
hopes,  his  eager  expectations,  and  at  once  unfolds  to 
him  the  true  Way.  Don't  you  wish  you  could  crush 
out  such  loneliness,  too?  Would  you  not  give  the 
treasures  of  purse  for  a  chance  to  bring  the  joy  of 
heaven  to  a  wearied  soul?  Why  not  try?  Why  not 
raise  to  your  honor  a  monument  of  grace  in  the  person 
of  a  Son  of  Adam  disengaged  from  the  guilt  of  sin? 
There  on  the  silent  hillside  the  ambitious  Hindu  sank 
on  his  knees  and  surrendered  himself  to  Christ.  No 
more  loneliness,  no  more  sorrow,  no  more  dread — he  is 
safe!  No  man  can  be  alone  when  Jesus  Christ  is  his 
invisible  companion. 

Ill 

I  have  pointed  out  the  malady ;  let  me  now  set  forth 
the  cure.  "  Let  not  your  heart  be  troubled ;  ye  believe 
in  God,  believe  also  in  me."  These  words  begin  the 
most  precious  chapter  in  the  entire  Bible.  The  gusts  of 
criticism  may  take  away  the  rest.  If  it  leaves  me  this, 
I  am  content.  The  sorrows  under  which  our  world 
groans  we  know.  We  know,  too,  the  prevalence  and 
virulence  of  sin.  And  we  seek  a  balm  that  can  heal. 
Here  it  is,  an  infallible  antidote,  a  veritable  pana- 
cea, faith  in  God  and  in  Christ. 

What  do  you  understand  by  faith?  We  have  it 
certainly  as  one  of  the  most  familiar  elements  in 
human  life.     We  could  not  go  on  without  it.     We 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  19 

should  find  business  practice  and  social  intercourse 
wrecked  and  gone,  if  this  quality  were  eliminated.  If 
I  had  not  faith  in  a  man's  honesty  I  should  never  trade 
at  his  store;  nor  would  you.  If  I  did  not  regard  the 
directors  of  the  bank  as  good  and  trustworthy  citizens 
I  should  take  out  what  little  money  I  have  there  at 
once.  If  I  thought  that  my  reputation  was  not  safe 
in  my  friend's  hands  I  should  cut  him  from  my  books 
without  delay.  That  is  the  value  we  put  upon  trust. 
Indeed,  the  financial  world  goes  further  and  builds  its 
entire  system  of  modern  business  on  a  series  of  credits ; 
a  chain  of  trust  so  gigantic  as  to  girdle  the  globe  with 
its  links.  In  these  days  currency  does  not  pass  from 
hand  to  hand,  from  office  to  office,  from  land  to  land; 
commercial  paper  standing  for  millions  or  for  mere 
units  is  the  basis  of  all  our  modern  transactions.  And 
that  is  the  symbol  of  trust. 

Well,  the  familiar  expedient  is  transferable  to  the 
spiritual  world.  Jesus  set  His  stamp  of  approval  on  it. 
We  have  used  His  words  in  a  medical  sense.  Let  us 
continue  the  figure.  Drugs  can  do  much  to  assist  the 
physician  in  his  work;  but  everything  they  cannot  do. 
When  it  comes  down  to  the  first  requisite,  they  must 
take  a  subordinate  place.  The  first  requisite  is  faith  in 
his  skill.  Many  a  case  has  been  cured  by  confidence 
in  the  power  of  the  man  who  is  called  in  to  aid.  And  for 
the  matter  of  that,  the  entire  treatment  must  be  per- 
meated with  faith.  For  who  would  take  the  pre- 
scribed medicines,  if  he  did  not  believe  in  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  man  who  gave  them? 

The  conditions  are  analogous.  We  are  in  need  of 
help.  The  Bible  recommends  faith  in  God.  We  are 
not  in  position  to  know  God.  We  cannot  even  tell  by 
severe  reasoning,  if  He  exist.     We  may  guess  at  it 


20  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

from  certain  things  we  are  sure  of  in  nature  and  from 
the  power  of  the  human  mind,  but  there  is  a  hiatus 
between  knowledge  and  the  superior  intuition  known 
as  faith ;  "  trusting  where  we  cannot  prove,"  as  Tenny- 
son says.  That  gap  can  never  be  filled,  seeing  that  we 
must  have  infinite  Intelligence  ere  we  can  know  God. 
Hence  we  have  got  to  trust,  we  must  capture  the  sweet 
reliance  on  the  gracious  love  of  God  that  shone  even  in 
the  Lord's  face. 

What  happens  if  we  refuse  to  exercise  faith?  Two 
things  immediately  follow:  first,  we  cannot  approve 
ourselves  to  God,  for  without  faith  it  is  impossible  to 
please  Him.  Inspect  the  records  of  the  Old  Testament 
and  the  New.  Study  their  peace,  their  joy,  their 
successes.  Whence  has  the  splendor  come?  What 
made  Abraham  great  and  David  strong?  What  awoke 
the  magnificent  pseans  of  praise  from  Isaiah's  lips  and 
the  stern  denunciations  of  evil  by  Jeremiah?  Noth- 
ing but  their  faith  in  the  living  God.  What  broke  Paul 
from  his  iron-bound  Pharisaism  and  Peter  from  the 
humdrum  tradition  of  his  family  occupation?  Noth- 
ing but  the  sense  of  an  overpowering  faith  in  the  di- 
vine Lord.    Such  is  the  first  effect  of  faith. 

The  second  is  like  unto  it,  a  serene  and  exemplary 
life  in  face  of  a  critical  company  of  observers.  Men 
have  tried  to  organize  a  moral  code  and  live  a  moral 
life  without  God;  they  have  failed.  Select  the  great- 
est books  on  ethics  that  cumber  our  shelves,  pile  them 
in  one  vast  heap,  let  their  wisdom  ascend  in  flames  to 
the  ether  above ;  and  the  world  loses  little  if  anything 
of  essential  worth.  We  are  not  wooed  to  rest  by  the 
ingenious  formulas  of  pragmatic  valuation;  but  let  the 
first  spark  of  grace  light  the  heart;  let  the  first  glint 
of  faith  play  on  a  man's  life,  and  a  change,  a  powerful 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  21 

awakening  ensues.  New  manhood  and  regenerated 
society,  chastened  business  principles  and  a  cleansed 
political  atmosphere  are  at  hand.  These  bespeak  the 
action  of  a  power  supernal.  These  are  the  indices  of 
faith.  If  God  gives  faith  to  a  nation  the  fountains 
of  falsehood  are  broken  up,  the  measures  of  dishonest 
dealings  are  rectified  and  the  interests  which  bind 
people  together  are  impregnated  with  the  spirit  of 
love.  May  God  give  such  faith  to  every  beleaguered 
nation  now,  a  faith  to  do  His  will  and  live  His  laws 
and  reflect  His  word.  Let  the  world  know  that  faith 
in  God  is  the  only  and  the  certain  cure  for  social  evils. 
Let  it  learn  the  incontestible  apothegm  that  no  man 
can  do  hurt  to  his  neighbor  if  he  find  in  him  the  mes- 
sage of  his  imperial  Maker.  Have  faith  in  God  and 
instantly  you  conceive  a  fine  resilient  faith  in  your 
fellows;  with  amazing  swiftness  you  see  unveiled  the 
better  side  of  their  character,  their  shadowed  sancti- 
ties, their  inner  hopes,  and  their  unmistakable  destiny. 

IV 

But  Christ  will  not  stop  there.  The  diseases  of 
the  heart  are  not  cured  by  a  general  trust  in  the 
divine  Being.  You  may  get  that  in  a  casual  way  in 
the  valleys  of  China  or  on  the  burning  plains  of  Arabia, 
where  the  Crescent  lifts  its  minarets  to  heaven  and 
the  pilgrim  spreads  out  his  robe  of  prayer.  Kaces  un- 
touched by  the  currents  of  civilized  life  have  a  dim 
conception  of  God  and  look  to  Him  with  awe.  The  red 
man's  fancy  is  soothed  or  stimulated,  as  he  thinks  of 
the  Great  Father  and  the  happy  hunting  grounds. 
There  is  a  dumb  unspeaking  trust  among  the  children 
of  our  kind  but  it  cannot  bring  lasting  peace ;  it  is  not 
enough.    There  must  be  revelation,  a  new  and  imme- 


22  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

diate  communication  from  God  to  His  people.  Some 
of  it  came  to  the  men  of  the  Old  Testament.  They 
gloried  in  their  Sinais  and  their  Hebrons,  their  smok- 
ing altars  and  devoted  temple.  But  even  these  were 
not  enough  to  convey  the  full  speech  of  the  Eternal. 

"  They  heard  the  trailing  garments  of  the  night 
Sweep  through  her  marble  halls;  " 

but  it  was  still  night.  The  daybreak  tarried.  Prophet 
and  seer  had  scanned  the  skyline  and  sensed 
the  glimmering  rays  of  dawn;  but  they  could  not  dis- 
cover the  rising  sun.  Even  the  favored  Baptist  by  the 
river's  brim,  with  eyes  holden  at  first  by  the  very 
shimmer  of  the  morning  light,  was  forced  to  cry, 
"  Art  thou  He  that  should  come  or  look  we  for  an- 
other?" Faith  in  God  as  the  Jews  conceived  it  was 
proudly  free,  beyond  the  fairest  dreams  of  uninspired 
fancy.  But  it  was  not  enough.  That  faith  though 
free  was  yet  vague  and  incomplete.  It  was  bathed  in 
the  shadows  of  fear.  It  was  bordered  by  the  noxious 
airs  of  ignorance.  Faith  in  God  was  the  beginning;  it 
awaited  its  consummation  in  a  new  and  personal  trust 
provoked  by  the  Incarnate  Lord.  Why  should  men 
have  faith  in  Him  ?    Let  us  see. 

We  should  believe  in  Jesus  because  He  alone  has 
given  the  correct  interpretation  of  God.  Much  as  we 
may  try  to  see  the  New  Testament  idea  of  God  fore- 
shadowed by  the  Old  we  are  haunted  perpetually  by 
the  recollection  that  for  Moses  and  David  and  even  for 
Isaiah  Jehovah  is  the  Magister  poenarum,  the  Awarder 
of  punishment.  Fear  is  perforce  the  sum  and  sub- 
stance of  faith.  I  believe,  because  I  covet  continuance 
of  life.  The  flashes  from  Sinai's  top  and  the  "  Holy, 
Holy,  Holy  "  of  the  angel  choir  tell  the  same  inevitable 


THE  STETHOSCOPE  OF  FAITH  23 

story.  Fear  is  a  factoring  element  in  religion.  God 
cannot  be  approached  with  the  unheeding  impetuous- 
ness  of  the  child.  The  Lord  did  not  fail  to  paint  in 
jflaming  colors  the  righteous  judgments  of  heaven, 
but  he  elicited  a  deeper  quality  from  its  abode  in 
Deity.  He  spoke  of  Love.  He  gave  to  God  a  new 
name.  He  called  Him  Father.  The  sweetest,  noblest 
relation  on  earth  he  seized  upon  in  order  to  depict  the 
holy  Grace  of  heaven.  A  quiver  of  rare  feeling,  I 
conceive,  must  have  passed  over  his  auditors  when  they 
heard  the  name.  God  had  been  known  as  the  Father 
of  Israel,  Creator  of  the  new  national  integrity.  He 
had  never  entered  the  individual  heart  with  intimate 
and  tender  affection  such  as  this.  Had  they  not  heard 
their  children  exclaim,  "  My  father  did  this,  my  father 
said  that?"  and  every  time  the  blood  ran  warmer  and 
the  nerves  waxed  stronger  for  the  duties  of  home  and 
fireside.  And  now  if  they  can  articulate  the  cry  of 
Father  to  the  Unseen  Spirit,  shall  not  fear  grow  pale 
and  burdens  be  lifted  ?  Law  has  given  way  to  love,  the 
thunders  of  Sinai  to  the  melodies  of  Galilee.  God  will 
not  decline  to  save  His  people.  His  permanent  war- 
rant is  the  face  and  cross  of  Jesus. 

We  should  believe  in  Jesus,  because  He  has  opened 
the  gate  of  life.  It  was  closed,  barred,  sealed,  shad- 
owed by  dark  uncertainty  before  this.  Men  had  hoped 
for  a  better  existence  hereafter ;  they  had  no  assurance, 
save  as  the  grave  injustices  of  this  current  world  stood 
sponsor  somehow  for  a  happier  issue  beyond  its  brink. 
The  faithful  of  the  Old  Testament  had  forsooth  seen 
the  fringe  of  a  glorious  Future,  as  the  divine  Lord 
passed  through  the  tents  of  His  people.  But  there 
was  no  assurance.  Now  all  is  altered.  Christ  Himself 
has  penetrated  the  realm  of  the  Dead,  opened  its 


24.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

secrets,  crushed  its  tyrannous  power  and  affirmed  the 
continuity  of  believing  life.  We  may  enter  rest 
through  Him ;  that  is  the  message  of  the  Bible.  If  we 
trust  His  power  we  may  entertain  hopes  of  the  same 
immortality.  Other  men  caught  at  shadows;  we  may 
bathe  in  the  splendor  of  proven  truth.  Troubles  are 
quenched  in  the  glorious  light,  inequalities  perish,  sin 

;  is  dead,  and  love  persists  the  unchallenged  Victor  of 

I  the  world. 
"The  medicine  of  an  evangelical  faith  has  brought 
the  last  full  comprehensive  cure  to  the  heart's  dread 
malady  and  Jesus'  promise  is  a  lucid  fact. 


II 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL,  THE  OBJECT 
OF  QUEST 

John  IJf  :4,  5.  "  And  whither  I  go  .  .  . 
ye  know  the  way.  Thomas  saith  unto  him, 
Lord,  we  know  not  whither  thou  goest,  and 
how  can  we  know  the  way?    I  am  the  way." 

IT  was  a  difference  of  angle  that  marked  the  thought 
of  Jesus  and  His  inquiring  disciple.  If  you  enter 
the  region  of  celestial  mechanics  and  measure  the 
relations  of  the  stars,  you  must  use  different  instru- 
ments from  those  which  mete  off  the  bounds  and  turns 
of  earth.  It  would  be  absurd  for  the  shipmaster  to 
try  to  determine  his  course  by  the  offices  of  the  theodo- 
lite. Good  enough  for  the  field,  for  the  city  street,  for 
the  stretch  of  shady  beach  upon  the  sea's  margin, — but 
how  could  its  chains  ever  reach  the  unplumbed  deeps 
of  the  sky? 

We  must  expect,  when  we  compare  the  Saviour's 
thoughts  and  ours,  to  find  a  broad  unspanned  interval 
between.  If  heaven  lay  near  to  Him, — nearer  than  it 
lies  about  a  child's  infancy, — and  if  that  same  heaven 
is  shut  tight  to  our  eyes,  to  Thomas,  to  Philip,  and 
even  to  St.  John  himself,  there  is  nothing  to  lament. 
The  angle  of  sight  is  different,  very  different.  He 
looks  from  the  point  of  view  of  eternity ;  we  can  gaze 
only  from  the  low  summits  of  time.  The  strange  thing 
in  this  verse  is  that  with  all  the  difference  of  vision 
Christ  tells  His  friend  that  he,  Thomas,  really  knows 

25 


26  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

though  he  protests  he  does  not.  He  says  nothing  as 
to  why  Thomas  should  know,  though  a  keener  mind 
would  have  caught  His  meaning  at  once.  He  simply 
enters  the  soul  of  this  untaught  Galilean  disciple  and 
finds  written  there  in  living  letters  a  truth  that  in 
later  days  would  blaze  forth  in  unspeakable  beauty. 

My  duty  here  is  to  follow  His  lead  and  insure  for 
you  possession  of  the  economic  principle,  that  not  the 
Goal  but  the  Way  is  the  object  of  all  spiritual  quest. 
This  was  a  suflScient  answer  to  the  young  man's  ques- 
tion and  it  will  be  to  any  you  may  put  today.  Let  us 
note  two  facts  in  our  discussion;  first,  the  capacity  of 
the  soul  for  knowledge,  and  secondly,  the  specific  thing 
we  are  to  know. 


If  any  man  thinks  the  Bible  has  no  place  for  human 
reason  he  makes  a  vast  mistake.  The  meddlesome  at- 
tempt to  set  reason  and  faith  in  opposition  is  vain.  It 
is  as  though  a  man  supposed  that  he  had  two  organs 
in  his  head,  one  for  thinking  and  the  other  for  trusting. 
There  is  no  more  truth  in  this  than  there  is  in  the 
theory  that  your  mind  is  by  nature  cut  up  for  you  into 
three  parts,  thought,  feeling,  and  will,  and  that  when 
you  use  one  compartment  you  seal  up  the  others,  just 
as  you  may  stop  all  communication  between  the  com- 
partments of  the  modern  steamship.  Whenever  a  man 
uses  his  mind  h'e  is  using  himself.  Now  religion  which 
springs  from  the  soul  and  not  the  body  must  use  the 
same  organ  that  science  exalts.  It  uses  the  several 
phases  of  the  mind,  too.  It  is  not  content  with  boiling 
over  in  fervid  emotion;  its  sole  effort  is  not  to  excite 
the  will,  often  considered  the  essence  of  manhood.  Re- 
ligion seats  itself  in  the  intelligence.     It  makes  its 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  27 

appeal  to  a  man's  capacity  for  knowing.  You  would 
be  surprised  to  find  how  many  times  Jesus  asks  for  the 
same  kind  of  certainty  that  the  scientist  demands. 

Study,  for  example,  the  word  which  is  imbedded  in 
this  text.  You  may  be  sure  that  the  evangelist  would 
translate  the  language  of  his  Lord  with  sympathetic 
exactness.  "  Ye  know  the  way."  There  are  two  ways 
for  knowing  a  thing.  One  regards  the  object  as  being 
in  position.  Any  citizen  of  the  town  having  passed  by 
a  particular  church  would  say,  "  I  know  the  Presby- 
terian church,"  and  his  use  of  the  term  would  be  cor- 
rect. In  the  same  way  one  person  may  remark  of  an- 
other, "Yes,  I  know  him;  I  meet  him  in  business 
circles,  on  the  street,  in  the  club.  I  know  where  he 
lives,  I  have  seen  his  family,  I  know  his  general  busi- 
ness standing."  That  is  one  well-defined  meaning  of 
the  word.  We  employ  it  without  reserve  and  some- 
times throw  into  it  more  implications  than  we  have  a 
right  to  do. 

There  is  another  turn  to  the  word;  the  knife  cuts 
deeper  now ;  the  sight  grows  keener.  We  approach  the 
thought  involved  in  Jesus'  assertion.  To  know  is  now 
not  simply  to  know  of,  but  to  know  about;  and  you  had 
better  be  careful,  when  you  cite  the  word  in  that  sense. 
The  courts  may  have  something  to  say  to  you,  if  you 
use  the  deeper  meaning  and  do  not  square  your  conduct 
with  your  language.  The  responsibilities  of  life  creep 
into  the  word  now;  you  must  weigh  well  every  letter 
ere  you  utter  it.  The  passerby  knows  the  church, 
knows  its  beautiful  proportions,  the  well-cut  stones, 
the  chaste  designs,  the  noble  tower,  the  handsome  win- 
dows dedicated  to  the  memory  of  saints  who  have  wor- 
shipped there.  But  oftentimes  he  knows  very  little 
else.    Does  your  knowledge  stop  there?    If  so,  it  is 


28  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

very  small  indeed.  Or  does  it  go  on?  Does  it  include 
the  purpose  of  the  church,  the  place  of  worship,  the 
"  beauty  of  holiness,"  the  consecration  of  many  lives 
to  the  service  of  Christ,  the  Holy  of  Holies,  where  many 
tender  hearts  have  found  the  hope  of  safety  through  a 
crucified  Redeemer?  That  I  take  to  be  the  higher 
signification  of  the  word,  and  would  that  you  might 
know  the  church  as  "  Bethel,"  the  House  of  God,  the 
very  gate  of  heaven ! 

Again,  one  man  makes  claim  to  know  another.  How 
much  does  he  know  of  him?  What  he  has  included  in 
his  statement  will  not  go  very  far.  I  fear  that  it 
wouldn't  throw  much  light  on  the  settlement  of  a  legal 
case.  You  cannot  know  an  acquaintance  until  you  get 
down  into  the  secret  processes  of  his  heart.  He  may 
be  very  calm,  very  prosperous  on  the  surface  but  under- 
neath there  is  a  caldron  of  conflicting  emotions.  Some 
men  take  pains  to  conceal  their  real  selves.  The  world 
outside  never  peers  into  the  nooks  and  crannies  of  the 
inner  life;  indeed,  is  never  allowed  so  to  do.  It  is  the 
sincere  friend  alone  who  can  be  said  to  know  another. 
Then  face  answereth  to  face  as  in  a  mirror;  then 
words  count  for  their  actual  value;  then  all  disguise 
is  torn  away  and  the  uncharted  deeps  are  opened. 
Thus  you  know  the  motives,  the  impulses,  the  un- 
hallowed thoughts,  the  profound  ambitions,  the  bitter 
defeats,  the  reasons  for  genuine  joy;  you  know  them 
all.  You  may  truthfully  say  that  you  know  the  man. 
That  is  the  sense  in  which  Jesus  used  the  word;  for 
John  has  it  so  in  his  Gospel.  "Ye  know  the  way," 
by  an  intimate  personal  contact  with  it ;  and  deny  it  or 
not,  Thomas  and  his  fellow-disciples  were  later  to  find 
out  that  Jesus  was  right. 

But  someone  meets  me  with  an  objection  here.     I 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  29 

shall  entertain  it  without  hesitation.  "  What  ground 
have  we  for  holding,  that  the  mind  can  take  in  religious 
truth  in  the  same  way  as  these  other  matters  you 
have  mentioned?"  I  have  referred  to  the  bias  some 
cherish  against  letting  reason  have  any  chance  in  the 
field  of  spiritual  realities.  It  is  not  my  business  here 
to  argue  that  out.  If  you  wish  light  on  the  sub- 
ject go  to  Cardinal  Newman,  before  he  got  involved 
in  the  bigotries  of  a  medieval  theology.  What  I  in- 
tend to  do  is  to  show  that  however  you  may  reason 
against  it  the  fact  is  plain,  men  insist  on  a  knowledge 
of  God.  They  call  it  "'  knowing  God,"  and  they  have 
just  as  much  right  to  the  word  as  the  physicist  has, 
when  he  speaks  of  knowing  the  law  of  gravitation. 
That  law  is  not  proven  by  contact  with  the  five  senses 
of  the  body ;  you  never  see  or  hear  or  touch  it.  It  is  a 
deduction  from  formulas  and  a  correct  deduction,  too. 
God  is  in  a  sense  a  deduction ;  for  Christ  says  to  Philip, 
"  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the  Father."  If  we 
hadn't  become  acquainted  with  Christ  our  acquaintance 
with  the  divine  Organizer  of  world  and  soul  would 
have  been  incredibly  small. 

But  I  prefer  to  start  the  argument  from  the  other 
end,  and  say  that  the  soul  gets  its  right  to  exclaim  "  I 
know,"  because  of  its  inherent  need.  We  cannot  do 
without  God.  We  could  not  have  come  into  being 
without  Him,  to  be  sure.  But  that  is  not  what  I  mean. 
The  substance  of  the  spiri^  of  man  is  plastic  in  the 
hands  of  the  great  Artificer.  We  cannot  fight  out  our 
controversies  alone;  we  cannot  solve  the  incessant 
problems  by  ourselves.  The  old  maxim  of  Augustine  in 
his  "  Confessions,"  a  reminder  of  the  subtle  tempta- 
tions with  which  he  wrestled   and   whose  power  he 


30  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

eventually  crushed,  awakes  in  us  a  thrill  of  sympa- 
thetic joy: — 

"  God  hath  made  us  for  Himself, 
And  our  souls  are  restless. 
Till  they  rest  in  Him." 

After  all,  it  is  not  argument,  it  is  just  plain  knowledge 
that  grips  the  soul.  It  is  the  return  of  Paul's  cer- 
tainty :  "  I  know  whom  I  have  believed."  There  we 
take  our  stand  as  Christians  in  ages  past  have  done. 
We  accept  the  challenge  our  Lord  flings  down :  "  Ye 
know  the  way."  Yes,  we  know  religious  truth,  and 
all  the  objectors  in  Christendom  cannot  deny  our  right 
to  its  possession. 

But  wait  one  moment!  If  we  have  a  right  to  know 
then  I  ask,  How  much  of  spiritual  reality  do  we  actu- 
ally hold  in  our  hand?  How  earnestly  have  we  striven 
to  get  at  the  meaning  of  divine  truth?  This  is  not 
tantamount  to  asking  how  much  you  know  of  the  Bible. 
For  a  man  might  commit  to  memory  every  precious 
passage  in  that  Book,  and  yet  know  nothing  of  the 
inner  heart  of  its  Author.  I  have  heard  the  words 
quoted  impressively  by  men  who  I  am  sure  never  caught 
the  animating  spirit.  They  had  not  reached  the  second 
level  of  knowledge  which  we  have  just  considered.  I 
say  to  you  that  no  man  shall  reach  it  who  refuses  to 
expend  some  effort.  Thomas  sulked  disappointed  and 
forlorn  on  the  lower  level,  complaining  that  he  did 
not  know  the  way  or  the  goal.  Why  should  he?  He 
had  accepted  the  common  ambition  of  the  Jew  as  the 
only  interpretation  of  the  Lord's  mission.  He  thought 
that  Jesus  was  going  to  raise  an  earthly  throne,  and  the 
scheme  pursued  by  Jesus  seemed  utterly  disqualified 
for  that  purpose.    Hence  he  was  confused.    He  didn't 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  31 

try  to  understand  his  Master's  purpose.  "  Too  bad," 
we  exclaim,  and  then  ourselves  slink  away  with  no 
true  attempt  at  understanding. 

Now  mark  these  words;  no  human  enterprise  thor- 
oughly worth  while  was  ever  carried  through  without 
a  prodigious  amount  of  work.  I  cited  the  law  of  gravi- 
tation. Do  you  know  how  much  effort  it  cost  Newton 
to  fix,  verify,  and  clinch  that  law?  For  twenty  years 
he  worked  on  a  suggestion  of  Kepler,  the  astronomer, 
turning  out  reams  of  figures  and  formulas,  catching  up 
the  slight  hint  of  a  falling  apple,  and  proving  at  last 
that  the  force  which  binds  the  moon  to  the  earth  is 
the  same  force  that  operates  in  the  biggest  and  the 
smallest  part  of  the  universe.  Well  did  he  merit  the 
tribute   of  a   distinguished   contemporary: — 

"  Newton  was  the  greatest  genius  that  ever  existed,  and  the 
most  fortunate;  for  we  cannot  more  than  once  find  a  system  of 
the  world  to  establish." 

I  commend  the  thought  to  you;  you  will  never  find 
out  God  except  by  searching.  Religion  demands  the 
best  energies  under  our  control.  You  have  no  hesi- 
tation in  applying  intelligence  and  zeal  to  the  prob- 
lems of  business,  physical  betterment,  moral  uplift 
for  the  state.  You  regard  any  author  as  crude  or  lazy 
if  he  will  not  use  his  abilities  to  enrich  our  literature 
instead  of  maiming  or  debauching  it  by  mediocre  serv- 
ice. Shall  we  ask  anything  less  in  the  realm  of 
spiritual  life? 

Moreover,  we  have  one  sanction  in  religion  which 
often  is  not  felt  in  other  matters ;  we  never  fail  to  get 
something  for  our  pains.  Even  this  uncertain  Thomas 
got  it  at  last.  No  soul  ever  passed  through  the 
breakers  as  Paul  did.     His  bigoted  friends  did  not 


32  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

suppose  that  the  prince  of  zealots  would  ever  be  lost 
to  their  cause.  The  church  heard  with  wonder  the 
report,  that  "  he  which  had  destroyed  now  preached  in 
the  name  of  Jesus,"  He  reached  the  coveted  haven,  he 
attained  the  promised  peace.  The  page  of  history  is 
sprinkled  with  the  toils  men  have  endured  and  the 
sufferings  passed,  from  which  no  adequate  reward 
issued.  That  strange  figure  which  amused  or  maddened 
the  age  of  Erasmus;  his  search  for  touchstone  or  for- 
mula which  might  change  the  baser  metal  into  gold, 
Paracelsus,  immortalized  in  Browning's  drama, — what 
is  he  but  a  type  of  many  a  fatuous  seeker  in  the  field  of 
human  endeavor?  You  spend  a  lifetime  in  the  quest 
of  goods,  deliberately  limit  your  spiritual  horizon, 
give  little  concern  for  the  development  of  family  affec- 
tion, no  time,  no  contribution  to  the  victory  of  moral 
truth  in  the  world ;  and  when  you  get  to  the  end  what 
kind  of  an  inventory  can  you  make  up?  You  know  a 
good  deal  about  stocks  and  bonds,  the  price  of  secur- 
ities, the  relation  of  Steel  to  the  country's  prosperity, 
and  the  thousand  and  one  details  of  a  business  career ; 
but  what  do  you  get  for  return  ?  Six  feet  of  earth  and 
the  epitaph:  "Whose  shall  these  be?"  That  is  not 
the  terminus  of  the  spirit's  quest.  God  provides  us 
knowledge  of  the  kind  that  fits  for  eternity.  And  if  you 
haven't  got  it  yet  you  had  better  awake  to  the  need 
of  prompt  attention,  ere  the  shadows  fall  and  your  soul 
be  bathed  in  the  chill  of  death. 

II 

We  advance  to  the  second  assurance  of  this  text,  viz., 
that  the  burden  of  our  knowledge  is  not  the  Goal  of 
Safety  but  the  Way  to  reach  it.  This  seems  to  have 
been  the  initial  diflSculty  in  Thomas'  mind :  "  Lord, 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  33 

if  you  don't  show  us  the  place  you  are  going  to,  how 
can  we  be  expected  to  find  out  the  road?"  I  fancy 
that  millions  of  readers  have  thanked  Thomas  for  his 
question  and  exclaimed :  "  That's  my  trouble,  too !  I 
want  to  know  the  end  and  then  I  shall  look  for  the 
way."  Well,  there  is  a  practical  hint  in  the  words 
which  we  ought  to  consider.  It  is  true  that  no  sen- 
sible man  starts  out  on  the  highway  without  having 
some  destination  in  view.  For  if  he  had  none  the 
inquiry  of  a  friend.  Where  are  you  going?  would  make 
his  course  seem  ridiculous.  It  is  also  true  that  a 
road  is  not  a  road  unless  it  ends  at  some  determined 
point.  I  remember  a  street  that  seemed  to  spring  right 
out  of  a  Western  city  into  the  prairie  beyond,  and 
no  end  in  sight.  But  the  end  was  definite  enough  when 
one  knew  it. 

It  might  appear,  then,  as  though  Christ's  implication 
did  not  square  with  the  facts :  "  Whither  I  go  ...  ye 
know  the  way."  Absurd  to  bid  them  seek  the  path 
when  the  objective  point  was  kept  secret,  or  at  least 
was  very  dimly  revealed!  Give  these  men,  give  us 
today  ample  information  about  the  goal  of  our  hopes 
and  we  shall  be  diligent  enough  in  searching  for  the 
course.  But  Jesus  was  not  immediately  concerned 
with  the  end;  He  wanted  His  disciples  to  get  their 
feet  on  the  right  road.  He  told  them,  there  was  a 
heaven;  He  taught  them  a  good  deal  about  the  king- 
dom of  God.  That  is  the  destination;  but  He  makes 
them  feel  just  here  that  all  discussion  of  Goal  is  use- 
less if  their  hearts  are  not  at  peace  with  God. 

I  am  convinced  that  this  is  right.  It  is  right  from 
the  standpoint  of  definition.  How  can  you  really 
know  what  heaven  is,  until  you  have  passed  through 
the  stages  that  lead  up  to  its  gate?    And  how  can  you 


34  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

begin  to  understand  thie  love  of  a  heavenly  Father 
unless  you  see  its  colors  and  hear  its  tones  in  the  Per- 
son of  His  Beloved  Son?  Take  the  young  prince  who 
expects  to  succeed  his  father  on  the  throne.  He  knows 
something  about  the  honors  and  responsibilities  of  the 
place  by  hearing  about  them  or  observing  them  in  his 
father's  demeanor.  But  he  cannot  understand  them 
without  a  severe  course  of  training  which  step  by  step 
fits  him  for  the  heavy  burdens  of  state.  The  Way 
must  be  known  before  the  Goal  can  be  suitably  appre- 
hended. Therefore,  it  is  not  our  business  to  strike 
the  high  poetic  range  of  fancy  and  make  gorgeous  pic- 
tures of  the  heavenly  City.  John  has  done  that  for  us 
and  we  had  better  let  it  drop  there.  Our  business  is  to 
get  in  touch  with  the  sacred  vehicle  by  which  we  may 
scale  the  heights.  Our  duty  is  to  follow  the  road 
marked  out  in  the  inspired  Book.  Let  us  hasten  to 
read  aright  this  symbol :  "  I  am  the  Way." 

The  Way  is  unfolded  in  a  Person;  the  way  is  a  Per- 
son. Never  before  was  such  a  proposition  presented 
to  a  thinking  world.  Multitudes  had  risen  up  to  an- 
nounce themselves  as  guides ;  none  had  ever  essayed  to 
be  the  Path.  The  founder  of  a  religion  is  not  an  unique 
personage.  We  have  had  enough  of  them,  men  who  boded 
good,  and  men  who  boded  evil.  We  have  seen  him  who 
having  passed  a  spotless  youth  taught  his  people  to  de- 
spise the  claims  of  body  and  win  redemption  by  the  sub- 
tle arts  of  discipline.  We  have  found  others  who  laid  the 
bonds  of  ceremony  on  aching  hearts  and  promised 
peace  thereby.  The  entire  gamut  of  human  ingenuity 
was  compassed,  and  still  the  anguish  of  an  unforgiven 
soul  remained.  Now  comes  One  who  puts  away  the 
machinery  of  religion  and  directs  attention  to  Himself. 
His  statements  are  mere  rubbish  if  He  be  as  other 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  35 

spiritual  leaders  have  been.  What  more  irrational 
than  this :  "  I  am  the  Light  of  the  world/'  "  I  am  the 
Bread  of  Life,"  if  Christ  were  just  another  Moses, 
just  another  Buddha  with  a  little  more  love  thrown  in ! 
Could  you  imagine  the  founder  of  the  Buddhist  re- 
ligion saying,  "  I  am  the  Light  of  the  world  "  ?  They 
have  said, — at  least  one  semi-poetic  journalist  has  said 
it, — that  Buddha  was  the  light  of  Asia;  and  so  in  a 
sense  he  was.  His  religious  tenets  kept  that  dark  land 
under  a  partial  spell  of  order.  But  Christ  is  the  Light 
of  the  world,  and  has  lighted  every  man  that  cometh 
into  the  world.  We  tie  up  to  a  Person  here,  not  to  a 
body  of  rules  nor  to  a  set  of  dry  formulas.  This  is  the 
fact,  which  first  of  all  distinguishes  Christianity  from 
other  religious  faiths.  It  is  a  fact  of  cardinal  im- 
portance. The  main  difiSculty  in  the  Old  Testament 
was  the  inability  to  make  God  intelligible  to  the  soul. 
Now  we  enter  His  presence  in  the  Person  of  His  Son. 
The  power  of  personality  has  never  been  so  elabo- 
rately proven  as  in  this  Life.  We  are  studying  the  soul 
today  with  unconquerable  zest.  We  delight  to  visit 
its  innermost  cells  and  hear  it  chant  the  notes  of  sov- 
ereignty, of  aspiration,  of  affection.  The  brain  as  an 
organic  product  is  the  subject  of  fascinating  interest; 
but  the  mind  that  sits  enthroned  there  is  of  incom- 
parably greater  interest.  We  delight  to  study  the 
action  of  one  personality  on  another,  noting  how  an 
insidious  influence  steals  from  one  man's  thought  into 
his  neighbor's.  We  are  charmed  with  the  play  of 
some  massive  emotion,  when  indignation,  for  example, 
sweeps  over  the  soul  and  breaks  out  in  tempestuous 
speech.  Did  you  ever  study  Christ  the  Lord  thus? 
Did  you  ever  trace  the  movements  of  love  in  His  face. 
His  words,   His  gestures?     Can  you  see  the  Face 


36  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

wreathed  in  gracious  smiles  as  He  takes  the  children 
on  His  knee  and  breathes  on  them  the  heavenly  bene- 
diction? Can  you  catch  the  affection  exuding  from 
His  heart  when  upon  the  cross  He  commits  His  mother 
to  the  safe-keeping  of  His  beloved  disciple?  That  was 
the  Person,  the  divine  Son,  the  holy  Master,  acting 
upon  other  persons  about  Him. 

Again,  did  you  ever  read  the  accents  of  righteous 
indignation  in  voice  and  look  ?  Ah !  those  mighty  in- 
vectives against  rebellious  cities,  Bethsaida,  Chorasin, 
Capernaum — how  the  wrath  of  an  offended  God  will 
fall  on  them !  Have  you  heard  the  scorn,  the  anger  in 
His  words  to  the  hypocritical  Pharisee :  "  Whited 
sepulchres,  beautiful  without  but  within  full  of  dead 
men's  bones ;  how  shall  ye  escape  the  condemnation  of 
hell  ?  "  Did  you  ever  listen  to  the  calm,  alluring  words 
of  invitation :  ''  Come  unto  me  and  I  will  give  you 
rest " ;  "  And  I,  if  I  be  lifted  up,  shall  draw  all  men 
unto  me  "?  With  a  Personality  like  this  He  bore  down 
opposition,  created  hope,  awakened  faith,  and  ce- 
mented the  convictions  of  His  followers  into  a  living 
church  which  today  holds  aloft  the  same  Form  as  its 
Lord  and  Saviour. 

To  Him,  then,  we  must  cling  for  safety;  to  this 
personal  Master  we  must  bend  will  and  desire.  At 
times  it  seems  that  a  nation's  life  hangs  on  the  efforts 
of  a  single  statesman.  What  but  Bismarck's  gigantic 
will  carried  Germany  to  her  new  position  in  the  world? 
What  but  the  quiet,  determined,  unyielding  service  of 
Cavour  stemmed  the  tide  of  disunion  and  welded  the 
separated  and  jealous  states  of  Italy  into  a  unified 
kingdom?  If  these  men  had  not  been  at  hand  would 
Europe  today  be  what  it  is?  Much  depends  on  the 
personal  equation  in  a  nation's  career.     Everything 


THE  WAY  NOT  THE  GOAL  37 

depends  on  the  Man  of  Galilee  in  the  matter  of  spirit- 
ual destiny.  To  God,  to  heaven,  to  a  life  of  i)erfect 
usefulness,  there  is  no  Way  but  His.  If  you  know  not 
that  Way,  that  is,  if  you  have  no  acquaintance  with 
Christ  you  will  not  reach  the  goal.  Your  business 
precisely  is  to  get  Him  into  your  heart. 

But  the  meaning  of  Christ  is  not  exhausted  when  we 
have  looked  into  His  Face.  We  must  also  take  note  of 
His  work.  We  may  chide  Thomas  all  we  please  for  his 
obtuseness.  He  should  have  known  that  this  quiet, 
reserved  citizen  even  with  his  supernatural  power 
would  not  try  to  unseat  the  Romans  from  their  au- 
thority; he  would  never  think  of  bundling  together 
these  fractious  and  centrifugal  Jews  and  making 
them  into  a  harmonious  nation.  He  couldn't  do  it ;  no- 
body could  do  it.  What  an  inept  and  miserable  dream ! 
And  yet  Thomas  was  a  patriot,  and  patriots  have 
clung  to  more  tenuous  hopes  than  this.  And  Thomas 
had  seen  Jesus  confound  Jews  and  Romans  alike  by 
His  incisive  answers.  Why  should  He  not  feel  that 
this  wonderfully  wise  leader  could  find  a  way  to  bring 
back  Israel's  greatness  and  make  Jerusalem  again 
truly  the  home  of  Jehovah? 

The  trouble  was  not  in  Thomas'  faith,  but  in  his 
knowledge.  He  did  not  know  the  secret  of  the  Lord's 
mission.  And  there  lies  the  trouble  with  much  of  the 
church's  impotence  today.  If  we  really  knew  that  the 
work  of  Jesus  was  to  save  this  world  by  blood  we 
should  put  aside  much  of  the  foolish  endeavor  which 
goes  by  the  name  of  Christian  service  and  get  down  to 
actual  work.  Therefore,  mark  the  true  definition  of 
His  work.  He  kept  telling  these  men  that  life  for  Him 
led  to  just  one  point,  a  bitter  death.  He  showed  them 
that   the   death   when    accomplished   should   efi:ect   a 


38  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ransom.  Ransom  implied  some  kind  of  bondage  not  of 
body  or  mind,  but  of  heart ;  and  the  only  heart-bondage 
we  know  is  sin.  Hence  the  death  of  Jesus  meant  re- 
lease from  sin.  But  for  whom?  For  the  Jews ?  for  the 
enlightened  nations  of  the  earth?  No,  for  "many," 
that  is,  for  all.  Jesus  was  to  die  to  save  mankind  from 
the  fruits  of  sin.  Such  is  the  mission  of  our  Master. 
Thomas  could  not  take  it  in  at  the  moment;  he  could 
not  see  that  his  own  destiny  was  written  there. 

Many  within  the  church  are  today  as  obtuse  and 
dark-minded  as  he.  If  we  knew  this  Way  as  we  are 
commanded  to  know  it  I  am  convinced  that  many 
enterprises  which  now  pass  for  Christian  would  be 
abandoned.  I  am  convinced  that  we  should  be  ashamed 
to  acknowledge  connection  with  some  of  the  social 
customs  that  are  now  in  part  patronized  by  the  church. 
If  we  knew  this  Way  as  we  are  commanded  to  know  it 
I  am  certain  that  we  should  be  humiliated  by  the  hol- 
lowness  of  our  attempts  to  preach  and  teach  the  Word. 
That  there  should  be  millions  at  this  moment  who 
have  never  heard  the  gracious  Name  is  a  fair  proof 
that  the  church  has  not  understood  the  meaning  of 
this  Way.  We  stand  now  before  the  mandate,  and 
before  the  opportunity;  shall  ye  let  them  go  by  un- 
answered ? 

Jesus  says  to  us,  "  YE  KNOW  THE  WAY." 


Ill 

SPIRITUAL  MOULDS 

John  llf  :5.  "  Thomas  saith  .  .  .  vs.  8, 
Philip  saith  .  .  .  vs.  22,  Judaa  saith  unto 
him." 

A  FAMOUS  English  writer  described  the  human 
mind  as  a  piece  of  white  paper  void  of  char- 
acters upon  which  piece  by  piece  the  story  of  a 
life  was  to  be  written.  A  better  figure  is  that  which 
occurs  often  in  the  Scripture,  the  clay  lying  plastic 
in  the  hands  of  the  potter,  the  mould  or  form  into 
which  or  about  which  it  is  to  be  fashioned,  the  infinite 
care  which  the  serious  Artificer  bestows  on  every  line 
and  curve,  and  lastly  the  finished  product  of  graces 
manifold  and  charm  untold. 

I  stood  one  day  in  the  spacious  halls  of  the  Sfevres 
manufactory  near  Paris.  The  operator  was  at  work 
on  a  delicate  vase,  oblivious  of  our  presence.  Deftly, 
benevolently  his  hands  pressed  the  yielding  clay.  It 
seemed  almost  like  a  thing  of  life  under  his  touch,  like 
a  creature  of  his  own  flesh.  Slowly  the  vessel  took 
shape,  slowly  the  dainty  features  of  the  design  were 
woven  into  the  texture  of  the  earth.  Compared  with 
the  speed  of  the  whirling  machine  the  growth  of  the 
vase  was  tedious.  But  there  was  no  tedium  in  the  eye 
of  the  artisan.  He  was  engrossed  in  his  task.  He  was 
modeling  a  piece  that  the  world  of  taste  would  marvel 
at.     Here  porcelain  art  had  its  throne.     Here  were 

39 


40  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

gathered  the  exquisite  moulds  of  beauty.  No  equal  to 
them  exists  in  museum  or  potter's  room  over  all  the 
earth.    No  wonder  the  fascination  is  intense! 

Spiritual  moulds  are  being  framed  more  precious  in 

worth,  more  enduring  in  essence.    The  human  soul  has 

its  types.     They  are  various,  diversified  beyond  the 

power  of  a  single  mind  to  calculate.     Never  yet  has 

nature  wrought  out  two  faces  of  exact  similitude.    The 

lineaments  are  the  same,  the  organs  of  response  to 

outward  suggestion  are  the  same.    The  racial  color  or 

the  national  tinge  or  the  reflection  of  temperament 

may  make  a  change  in  expression  and  specify  the  group. 

And  yet  no  man  exactly  repeats  the  inward  life  of 

his  neighbor.    Striking  elbows  in  the  jostle  of  the  street 

,  we  walk  antipodally  apart  in  the  secrecy  of  spirit. 

I  What  is  the  cast  of  your  thought?     "Thomas  saith 

!  .  .  .  Philip  saith  .  .  .  Judas  saith,"  three  souls  that 

,  had  but  a  single  word  in  common,  "  Master." 


We  study  first  the  man  Thomas.  To  sum  up  his  sa- 
lient traits,  let  us  call  him  the  Stubborn  Critic.  Others 
have  seen  in  him  the  apostle  of  realism,  the  skeptic,  the 
man  with  the  gloomy  disposition.  In  a  measure  he  was 
each  and  all  of  these;  but  neither  one  does  justice  to 
the  disciple  whom  Jesus  would  not  allow  to  drop  out  of 
the  sacred  circle.  To  be  sure  we  have  only  a  partial 
portrait.  Saving  his  name  in  the  list  of  apostles,  we 
see  him  only  three  times  in  the  entire  evangelical  nar- 
rative. We  must  be  careful  then  not  to  read  into  his 
character  what  pious  fancy  might  like  to  find  there. 
But  we  have  enough  to  catch  one  or  two  definite  ele- 
ments in  the  picture  and  by  these  we  take  our  stand. 

He  was  fundamentally  a  critic.    He  could  not  help 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  41 

being  it.  He  was  born  with  that  breath  in  his  body, 
and  sanctified  or  not  he  would  die  breathing  its  air. 
Now  the  temper  of  inquiry  which  he  evinced  was  not 
native  to  the  Hebrew  blood.  The  Old  Testament  does 
not  ask  questions  as  to  the  Why  and  the  How,  certainly 
not  in  the  matters  of  natural  science.  It  does  weigh 
with  exceeding  anxiety  the  questions  of  moral  right 
and  divine  judgment.  The  Book  of  Job  seethes  with 
vehement  interrogations.  Every  page  is  seamed  with 
an  indignant  or  submissive  plea.  It  treats  of  such 
facts  as  the  immortality  of  the  soul  and  the  ineffable 
course  of  the  stars;  but  it  never  discusses  the  origin 
of  life  or  the  source  of  the  firmament's  order.  Israel 
lived  in  a  drama,  and  a  drama  never  gives  reasons. 
Israel  wrote  a  history,  and  a  history  is  lucent  with 
facts,  while  the  grounds  of  action  are  hidden  beneath  a 
canopy  of  impenetrable  mystery.  But  somehow 
Thomas  had  scented  the  fragrance  of  Hellenic  wisdom. 
Cradled  by  the  borders  of  another  civilization  in  "  Gal- 
ilee of  the  Gentiles,"  he  must  have  found  keen  enjoy- 
ment in  the  exchange  of  views  with  men  of  a  different 
race.  I  venture  to  think  that  he  puzzled  and  annoyed 
his  boyish  friends,  exasperated  his  elders  and  got  him- 
self cordially  disliked  for  his  pains.  Even  the  gracious 
presence  of  the  Lord  could  not  extinguish  the  critical 
temper.    Let  us  see  how  it  developed. 

There  are  two  phases  to  criticism  you  are  aware,  the 
one  concerns  the  facts  to  be  determined,  the  other  the 
statement  of  their  truth.  The  one  says  you  must  be 
sure  that  things  are  as  they  are  represented  to  be.  This 
was  Thomas'  position  on  the  day  of  the  resurrection. 
He  wanted  to  see  the  revived  Lord  just  as  eagerly  as 
the  other  men  in  the  apostolic  band.  His  affection  was 
as  deep  and  as  pervasive  as  theirs.    But  he  was  held 


42  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

back  by  an  inward  compulsion;  he  could  not  believe 
without  evidence.  He  must  satisfy  the  demands  of 
judgment  by  a  careful  and  first-hand  scrutiny  of  the 
facts.  It  was  his  nature  to  test  the  articles  of  proof, 
just  as  it  is  the  instinct  of  ponderous  animals  to  test 
every  place  they  tread  upon. 

There  can  be  no  valid  objection  to  this  course.  In 
fact  we  need  the  habit  of  critical  scrutiny  in  the  affairs 
of  religion.  We  swamp  our  souls  in  a  flood  of  dogmas 
that  have  no  real  value  to  faith.  We  fill  the  church 
with  a  multitude  of  crude  and  uninspected  members 
whose  religious  experience  and  insight  are  at  a  mini- 
mum. I  believe  in  making  the  tests  of  discipleship  so 
rigid  that  only  the  strong  spirit  will  dare  to  accept. 
Jesus  did  that ;  He  required  that  a  man  must  be  willing 
to  give  up  his  dearest  friend  and  his  most  coveted 
ambition  in  order  to  follow  in  His  steps.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  is  possible  to  make  your  critical  inspec- 
tion too  rigid.  You  may  refine  doctrine  and  sublimate 
character  so  that  no  soul  on  earth  can  reach  the  height 
proposed.  Thus  you  bar  the  kingdom  to  silent,  timid 
souls  who  dare  not  venture  out  on  the  mountaintops  of 
faith  but  crouch  anxiously  and  in  fear  at  their  base. 
True  criticism  demands  that  the  central  light  be  clear, 
but  it  is  not  at  first  concerned  with  the  reflection  of 
the  several  satellites. 

Once  more,  the  critical  habit  insures  a  clear  state- 
ment of  the  truth.  It  must  have  it.  Thomas  was  in 
quest  of  it  and  erred  in  overestimating  its  value.  For 
example,  he  puts  his  question  to  the  Lord  at  the  Table : 
"  We  know  not  whither  thou  goest  and  how  can  we 
know  the  way?  "  Now  plainly  it  would  be  very  foolish 
to  pursue  any  path  unless  you  had  determined  the  goal 
of  the  journey.    Otherwise,  you  might  wander  in  the 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  43 

thicket  of  the  woods  and  never  get  the  benefit  accruing 
to  the  man  who  followed  a  straight  road.  The  critical 
mind  of  the  disciple  saw  a  fallacy  in  Jesus'  teaching; 
at  least  he  thought  he  did.  And  he  unceremoniously 
called  on  Christ  to  correct  His  reasoning,  elucidate 
His  point,  make  them  see  just  what  He  meant  by  tell- 
ing them  that  they  knew  the  way.  It  is  quite  evident 
that  you  never  get  anywhere  until  you  fix  your  mind  on 
some  object.  We  are  constantly  bidding  young  men 
to  make  choice  of  trade,  business,  or  profession.  "  Fix 
your  eye  on  some  definite  goal,"  is  the  counsel  of  the 
wise  father  or  instructor.  We  give  the  same  admo- 
nition in  religious  life.  We  urge  men  to  decide  what 
particular  thing  they  can  and  will  do  for  the  church, 
and  then  apply  every  ounce  of  energy  to  its  attainment. 
Thomas  from  that  point  of  view  was  right. 

But  viewed  from  a  deeper  recess  of  faith  he  missed 
the  Lord's  glorious  message.  He  did  not  understand 
that  unseen  realities  were  recognized  by  their  visible 
symbols.  He  could  know  God  only  by  knowing  His 
manifested  Son.  There  his  criticism  failed.  And  there 
criticism  always  fails.  There  the  unrelenting  critical 
attitude  towards  the  Bible  in  late  years  has  made  its 
vital  mistake.  We  do  not  refuse  to  submit  the  Book  to 
historical  tests.  We  glory  in  the  fact  that  the  Bible  is 
a  thoroughly  human  document,  is  the  drama  of  in- 
nocence and  tragic  fall  and  mighty  Redemption,  is 
therefore  nothing  apart  from  its  human  constituents. 
You  must  have  men  with  feeble  hearts  and  cringing 
consciences,  or  you  could  never  have  the  sacred  Scrip- 
ture. But  the  Bible  has  proved  itself  possessed  of  value 
attaching  to  no  other  book.  Hence,  while  we  gather 
inspiration  from  a  knowledge  of  the  times  and  moral 
forces  at  work  when  its  actors  lived,  we  must  be  at 


44  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

pains  to  preserve  the  sacred  element  here  only  embodied, 
namely,  the  movement  of  God  on  human  souls.  We 
shall  not  idolize  the  Bible ;  we  shall  not  wrap  its  pages 
in  the  impermeable  asbestos  of  supersanctity  and  shut 
out  all  critical  research.  We  require  simply  this, 
that  men  see  and  acknowledge  the  power  of  its  truth. 
Then  the  inspiration  of  the  Book  will  take  care  of 
itself ! 

A  peculiar  danger  meets  the  man  who  uses  the 
critical  temper  without  restraint.  He  begins  to  regard 
it  as  a  sure,  an  irresistible  weapon  of  attack  and  an  in- 
vulnerable shield  against  his  opponents'  arguments. 
It  develops  stubbornness  in  the  soul,  the  last  thing  a 
man  of  reason  ought  to  have  and  the  very  first  thing 
that  Jesus  assailed  in  the  religious  attitude  of  His  day. 
It  is  a  simple  matter  to  trace  the  moulding  of  a  stub- 
born heart.  Look  at  Thomas.  When  the  Lord  appeared 
to  the  disciples  that  first  Sunday  the  man  of  critical 
mind  was  not  there.  Where  was  he?  He  should  have 
been  there,  we  exclaim.  It  was  his  business  to  cling  to 
the  enfeebled  company  and  contribute  his  help,  however 
little  it  might  be.  The  fact  was,  Thomas  did  not  see 
how  Jesus  could  return  again,  indeed  never  gave  a 
thought  to  its  possibility,  so  contrary  was  such  an 
event  to  the  order  of  nature.  Hence,  no  good  reason 
appeared,  why  they  should  retain  their  organization. 
They  might  as  well  disband,  mingle  again  in  the  ave- 
nues of  accustomed  service,  and  forget  their  heavy  sor- 
row. This  was  not  John's  way  to  be  sure,  but  it  might 
well  have  been  Thomas'  decision.  In  that  state  of 
mind  the  belated  disciple  was  when  his  friends  greeted 
him  with  their  mystifying  announcement :  "  We  have 
seen  the  Lord ! "  Seen  the  Lord  ?  gotten  a  view  of 
diaphanous  spirit?  ridden  the  clouds  to  the  unriven 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  45 

vault  of  heaven  ?  Impossible !  They  had  made  a  gross 
and  inexcusable  mistake.  Their  passion  had  run  away 
with  them.  Their  zeal  had  quenched  forever  all  crit- 
ical, dispassionate  inspection  of  facts.  The  dead  can- 
not arise,  not  even  the  enmiracled  Lord.  You  may  al- 
most detect  the  settling  of  stubbornness  in  his  mind. 
He  will  not  believe;  or,  if  he  do  believe,  it  must  be  on 
conditions  which  he  deems  absolutely  impossible  of 
verification.  He  must  see  the  hands  and  touch  the 
wounds. 

My  friend,  we  stand  in  mortal  danger  of  emulating 
the  unworthy  example  we  have  just  studied.  Obsti- 
nacy is  not  an  isolated  state.  It  did  not  cease  with 
Thomas.  It  is  not  confined  to  boyhood.  I  have  seen 
it  in  mature  men.  I  have  found  it  in  the  life-story  of 
pronounced  saints.  It  is  not  a  Christian  quality;  it  is 
the  mere  counterfeit  of  conscientiousness.  Don't  con- 
found the  two.  To  be  stubborn  in  defense  of  a  poor 
dogma  or  a  pet  method  is  not  the  same  as  unselfish  de- 
votion to  truth.  If  you  resign  from  office  because  you 
cannot  have  your  way,  think  not  that  history  will  write 
you  down  as  a  man  of  strong  character.  Stubbornness, 
or  as  Dr.  Alex.  Whyte  calls  it,  "  mulishness,"  is  not  in- 
scribed on  the  standards  of  Christian  perfection.  It  is 
a  blot  on  the  escutcheon,  not  a  mark  of  honor.  Thomas 
would  have  lost  his  soul  by  it  had  the  Saviour  not  come 
in  gracious  indulgence  and  granted  him  his  wish. 
You  may  lose  your  place  in  the  church  and  perhaps 
your  seat  in  heaven  by  clinging  tenaciously  to  what  you 
call  your  "  conscientious  convictions."  Remember 
Thomas  and  pulverize  your  pride,  for  that  is  the  real 
name  to  this  vice.  Remember  Thomas  and  be  sure 
of  this :  that  criticism  pushed  to  the  extreme  becomes 
a  mania,  a  disease,  a  moral  disaster,  and  as  Christian 


46  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

disciples  you  can't  afford  to  block  influence  and  service 
by  an  uncompromising  adherence  to  it. 

II 

We  turn  the  page  and  come  upon  Philip.  He  is 
more  like  the  common  run  of  mankind  and  hence  does 
not  irritate  us  so  much  by  his  foibles.  We  think  we 
should  not  have  asked  his  question,  had  we  been  seated 
at  the  Table.  The  words  of  Christ  were  plain  enough 
for  a  child  to  grasp.  His  lips  had  breathed  the  soft 
zephyrs  of  heavenly  love.  Surely,  God  was  in  His 
person  more  than  He  had  ever  been  in  the  person  of  a 
human  creature.  No,  we  could  never  have  misappre- 
hended the  mystic  letters  of  truth  that  Jesus  bore  in 
His  life.  But  Philip  did,  and  Philip  deserved  the  re- 
buke administered  by  his  Master.  How  the  chastening 
notes  of  disappointment  would  have  struck  down  deep 
into  the  soul  of  a  responsive  believer!  This  may  be 
true.  We  may  be  more  awake  to  the  call  of  duty,  more 
sensitized  to  the  subtle  turns  of  truth  today,  though  I 
doubt  it.  But  the  simple  fact  was  that  Philip's  mind 
was  cast  in  the  mould  of  practicality  and  he  did  not 
see  at  once  the  finer  facts  of  revelation.  He  is  not 
alone.  He  is  the  type  of  men  who  through  the  long 
ages  of  the  world's  history  have  sought  a  visible  demon- 
stration of  truth.  They  do  not  distrust  the  deeper 
things;  they  simply  cannot  thread  their  way  offhand 
into  the  mystery. 

Philip  was  practical.  Every  item  in  his  career  fur- 
nishes proof.  Let  me  collect  the  several  incidents  for 
you  and  invite  you  to  measure  them  by  this  common 
denominator.  Jesus  called  him  to  the  ranks  of  dis- 
cipleship  and  he  accepted  the  call  as  a  practical  op- 
portunity to  cultivate  the  religious  life  his  nation  stood 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  47. 

for.  His  belief  was  what  the  man  in  the  street  could 
understand.  It  had  two  parts,  first  the  promise  of  the 
ancient  Scripture,  and  secondly,  the  exact  fulfillment 
in  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth.  You  know,  practical  men 
are  wont  to  set  forth  their  business  in  statistical  form, 
assets  on  one  side,  liabilities  on  the  other.  The  thor- 
oughgoing merchant  can  tell  you  precisely  where  he 
stands  at  the  end  of  the  fiscal  year.  The  banking  in- 
stitution puts  its  affairs  down  in  black  and  white,  and 
is  extremely  careful  to  strike  a  correct  balance.  Every 
government  that  expects  to  escape  bankruptcy  must 
fix  the  budget  of  resources  and  expenditures  and 
adhere  to  it.  Philip  had  the  business  sense  and  devel- 
oped it  in  his  relations  to  the  Lord  and  the  apostolic 
company.  He  said  to  Nathaniel,  Come  and  see.  Not 
argument  but  visible  contact  is  the  rule  of  business 
success.  When  Jesus  asked  him  how  to  feed  the 
hungry  host  he  calculated  the  cost  and  compared  it 
with  the  contents  of  the  collective  purse.  When  the 
Greeks  came  in  quest  of  the  new  Teacher  he  conferred 
with  his  friend  Andrew  as  to  ways  and  means  for 
effecting  this  unheard-of  interview.  And  lastly,  when 
the  sermon  got  too  deep  for  his  understanding,  he  ex- 
claimed, with  the  same  devotion  to  concrete  facts: 
"  Show  us  the  Father,  and  that  will  be  sufficient ! " 

The  Practical  man  is  frequently  a  safeguard  to 
human  society.  He  is  always  a  conservative.  He  does 
not  follow  the  phantasmagoric  figures  of  a  lively 
imagination.  He  believes  in  the  logic  of  facts.  He 
will  stake  the  order  of  the  present  against  the  promise 
of  future  progress,  because  he  knows  and  sees  the 
former,  but  the  latter  is  as  yet  an  undetermined  quan- 
tity. He  is  the  man  of  experience.  He  generally  has 
some  years  on  his  head.    The  tender  youth  is  wrapped 


48  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

in  the  visions  of  hope;  the  settled  man  of  affairs  rules 
by  the  wealth  of  acquired  habits.  In  matters  of 
finance  he  never  takes  a  risk.  He  makes  his  invest- 
ments in  securities  of  acknowledged  worth.  In  the 
stream  of  politics  he  stands  for  the  policies  now  in 
vogue,  and  abhors  the  cunning  schemes  that  visionaries 
devise,  with  which  to  tickle  the  public  ear.  He  believes 
in  making  haste  slowly.  He  throws  the  weight  of  his 
influence  into  the  party  that  promises  not  to  disturb 
the  current  method  of  business  and  social  action.  In 
the  holy  sphere  of  religion  he  seeks  results.  He  cares 
for  none  of  the  subtleties  of  creed.  He  believes  that  a 
man  should  prove  his  creed  by  his  deed ;  and  if  he  can 
exhibit  no  deeds  then  his  creed  is  worthless.  He  echoes 
with  a  kind  of  solemn  glee  the  dictum  of  the  Saviour, 
"  Not  every  one  that  saith  unto  me,  Lord,  Lord,  shall 
enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven;  but  he  that  doeth 
the  will  of  my  Father  which  is  in  heaven."  If  you 
don't  work  your  prayers  out,  he  argues,  you  evacuate 
them  of  their  power.  The  influence  of  the  Philips  in 
modern  church  life  is  large  and  to  all  seeming  on  the 
increase.  It  is  they  who  stand  behind  the  various 
"  movements,"  that  are  common  features  to  the  ecclesi- 
astical landscape  at  present;  stand  behind  them  with 
their  money,  and  their  time,  and  their  energetic 
speech.  They  want  to  see  Christianity  objectified  in 
the  machinery  of  the  church,  in  the  network  of  mis- 
sionary organizations,  in  the  Brotherhoods  and  bands 
and  multiplied  forms  of  religious  service.  They  must 
have  God  manifest  in  the  busy  hospital  or  find  His 
marks  in  the  bread-line  of  a  great  city.  Otherwise, 
they  cannot  see  Him  at  all.  We  rejoice  in  the  serious 
consecration  of  such  practical  minds.  We  need  them, 
now;  need  them  as  protest  against  the  encroachments 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  49 

of  Mammon;  need  them  as  answer  to  the  insinuation 
that  the  Christian  faith  is  a  piece  of  flabby  sentiment 
and  not  an  order  for  social  development;  need  them 
to  teach  the  wiseacres  direct  from  college  theorizing 
that  all  the  sociology  of  modern  life  is  not  monop- 
olized by  the  non-religious  settlements  in  the  heart  of 
great  cities.  For  these  and  other  sufficient  reasons 
we  need  great  souls  steeped  in  practical  ideas, — 
Marthas  cumbered  with  much  serving,  who  have  no 
time  and  little  inclination  to  sit  at  the  Master's  feet 
and  imbibe  the  simple  truths  of  piety;  Peters  who 
having  their  own  commission  turn  to  the  Johns  and 
ask,  What  shall  these  men  do?  Yes,  we  need  them, 
and  divine  opportunity  is  raising  up  a  notable  line  of 
effective  workers  in  His  church. 

But  while  we  praise  such  devotion  we  must  enter  a 
word  of  caution.  Philip's  very  practical  sense  became 
an  avenue  of  danger.  He  could  not  see  the  Father  | 
without  an  ocular  demonstration.  Moses  had  such 
a  vision;  Isaiah  was  carried  into  the  throne-room 
of  the  King;  Zechariah  marveled  at  the  angelic  minis- 
tries revealed  to  him.  Could  not  Jesus  bring  the 
Father  down  to  the  level  of  their  eyes?  Mere  spirit- 
ual vision  was  not  enough;  it  was  too  deceptive;  it 
was  perhaps  only  an  idea,  with  no  basis  in  fact. 

Well,  the  mistake  of  Philip  is  a  common  one.  It  \ 
proceeds  on  the  assumption  that  theory  is  nothing  and  | 
facts  are  everything.  I  can  remember  how  we  used 
to  debate  the  relative  value  of  the  two  in  student  days, 
and  some  of  us  caught  by  the  ruling  temper  of  the 
nation  were  inclined  to  put  all  stress  on  practice  and 
little  on  the  speculation  that  lay  beneath,  made, 
guided,  and  inspired  all  substantial  progress  in  human 
life.    We  did  not  see  then,  as  we  discovered  later,  that 


50  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

you  cannot  have  practice  without  some  kind  of  theory. 
Every  great  invention,  every  epochal  discovery  has  its 
roots  in  a  series  of  investigations  marked  by  the  test 
of  theories, — the  acceptance  of  some,  and  the  rejection 
of  others.  The  Roentgen  rays  did  not  spring  suddenly 
into  being  in  the  laboratory  of  a  German  experi- 
menter; they  are  the  results  of  a  long  and  arduous 
experimenting  with  the  forces  that  make  them  so 
effective  an  instrument  in  modern  science,  especially 
Surgery.  The  two  phases  of  the  mind  must  go  along 
hand  in  hand.    Neither  is  of  use  without  the  other. 

We  must  impress  this  thought  on  the  social  students 
of  the  present.  There  is  and  always  has  been  a  con- 
flict between  the  so-called  producing  and  non-produc- 
ing classes  of  society,  that  is,  those  who  work  with 
their  hands  and  those  who  work  with  their  brains.  In 
reality  such  a  conflict  does  not  exist.  The  two  groups 
make  up  the  one  whole.  Both  we  must  have,  or  society 
goes  instantly  to  pieces.  But  we  are  particularly  in- 
terested in  the  matter  as  regards  religious  life.  Creed 
and  deed  have  contemporaneous  and  vital  places  in  the 
hearts  of  believers.  We  hear  the  intermittent  outcry 
against  theology : — "  Take  it  away ;  it  has  ever  been  a 
divisive  element  in  the  life  of  the  church;  it  has  set 
up  persecuting  schools,  blocked  the  path  of  missionary 
effort,  absorbed  a  multitude  of  powers  that  should 
have  been  turned  into  the  channel  of  service.  Not 
thought  but  life  is  the  body  of  religion.  We  don't  care 
what  a  man  believes,  so  long  as  he  does,"  Thus,  the 
protest  goes  on,  sometimes  with  bitterness,  sometimes 
I  with  good-natured  scorn.  But  every  once  in  a  while 
the  world  gets  a  glimpse  of  the  vacuity  of  deed  with- 
out creed,  when  a  man  prolific  in  good  works  sinks  into 
the  waters  of  some  annihilating  sin;  or,  when  some 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  51 

religious  movement  usurping  the  name  "  Christian  " 
proves  by  its  deeds  how  far  from  the  spirit  and  scope  of 
Christianity  it  has  withdrawn. 

Thus  the  protest  rings  its  changes  in  the  ears  of 
modern  man  and  shall  do  so  until  the  church  loyal  to 
her  Lord  and  His  truth  rises  to  answer  Philip's  ques- 
tion, as  He  did :  "  Have  I  been  so  long  time  with  you, 
and  yet  hast  thou  not  known  me?  He  that  hath  seen 
me,  hath  seen  the  Father ! "  Theology,  in  other  words, 
is  equivalent  to  Christ.  If  you  despise  the  themes  of 
Scripture  you  despise  the  heart  of  Him  who  gave  them 
to  the  world.  If  you  despise  Him  and  refuse  to  see  in 
Him  the  face  of  the  Father,  where,  we  ask,  shall  you 
ever  look  to  get  the  vision  of  pardoning  love  and  eter- 
nal Hope? 

"  I  say,  the  acknowledgment  of  God  in  Christ, 
Accepted  by  the  reason,  solves  for  thee 
All  questions  in  the  earth,  and  out  of  it. 
And  has  so  far  advanced  thee  to  be  wise. 
Wouldst  thou  unprove  this  to  re-prove  the  proved  ? 
In  life's  mere  minute,  with  power  to  use  that  proof. 
Leave  knowledge,  and  revert  to  how  it  sprung? 
Thou  hast  it;  use  it,  and  forthwith,  or  die!  " 

III 

The  third  query  at  the  Table  came  from  Judas,  and 
it  was  so  manifestly  the  opinion  of  all  the  men  that 
we  do  not  get  any  special  light  on  the  character  of 
the  asker.  One  thing  that  is  said  of  him,  however, 
must  be  mentioned.  The  Evangelist  warns  us  against 
confusing  him  with  the  man  of  Kerioth  who  betrayed 
his  Lord.  Hence,  negatively  at  least  we  get  one  line  in 
the  portrait :  he  was  true  to  his  Leader.  He  may  have 
deserted  Him  in  the  hour  of  crisis  but  he  did  not  sur- 


62  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

render  Him  to  the  hands  of  sinners.  It  is  sometimes  a 
disadvantage  to  have  the  same  name  as  a  malefactor. 
That  strange  intangible  mind  which  we  call  Public 
Opinion  will  link  unconsciously  name  to  man  and  do 
incredible  injustice  at  times.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is 
a  distinct  benefit  to  the  good  man  to  have  his  virtues 
thrown  into  strong  relief  by  the  baseness  of  his  name- 
sake. How  white  the  snow  seems  when  seen  by  the 
black  soil  of  earth!  Judas,  we  are  sure,  lost  nothing 
by  the  comparison. 

But  we  derive  a  positive  trait  in  the  picture,  too,  by 
studying  the  question  he  put.  "How  has  it  come  to 
pass.  Lord,  that  thou  wilt  manifest  thyself  to  us  and 
not  unto  the  world  ?  "  From  his  words  we  gather  that 
Jesus  formerly  taught  them  His  desire  to  get  the  news 
of  pardon  at  once  to  the  desolated  heart  of  mankind. 
But  a  change  has  come  over  His  mind;  He  tells  them 
now  that  He  will  manifest  Himself  only  to  them,  and 
the  world  must  remain  in  its  stupor  of  despair.  Or, 
He  had  once  assured  them  that  He  would  follow  the 
expected  path  of  the  Messiah;  and  now  He  disclaims 
any  attempt  at  public  exposition  of  His  power;  He  is 
content  to  get  Himself  into  their  impressible  spirits. 
I  do  not  think  that  Judas  had  difficulty  with  the  idea 
of  manifestation;  that  would  trouble  Philip.  What 
Judas  did  not  perceive  was  this:  how  Jesus  could  be 
the  promised  Christ,  and  yet  not  assume  the  reins  of 
government,  unyoke  Israel  from  her  captors,  restore 
the  kingdom  to  her,  fulfill  piece  by  piece  the  covenants 
of  Jehovah,  and  elevate  Judah  to  the  throne  of  politi- 
cal as  well  as  spiritual  supremacy  over  the  world. 
This  was  the  traditional  view,  and  this  view  the  dis- 
ciples cherished  until  they  saw  the  Lord  take  His 
ascent  from  Olivet.    Then  the  final  disillusion  came, 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  53 

the  disillusion  that  received  a  sharp  wrench  beneath 
the  Cross  and  by  the  Tomb.  Then  all  the  old  expec- 
tations of  Israel  were  declared  to  be  crude  and  carnal 
as  compared  with  the  holy  Kingship  now  revealed. 

There  is  a  traditional  temper  in  the  world  that 
yields  to  progress  only  after  the  severest  experience. 
We  are  impressed  with  its  vigor.  It  protects  the  form 
long  after  the  inward  spirit  is  exhausted.  For  ex- 
ample, the  people  of  England  are  today  in  some  re- 
spects more  democratic  than  we  in  this  western  world. 
And  yet  they  almost  never  suggest  that  the  royal 
family  be  displaced  or  rank  be  abolished  or  the  govern- 
ment be  made  in  name  what  it  seems  to  be  in  fact,  a 
representative  republic.  The  goad  of  hoary  tradition 
is  felt.  The  "  boast  of  heraldry,  and  the  pomp  of 
power"  still  hold  undisputed  sway  on  English  soil. 
But  it  is  in  religion  that  tradition  is  strongest.  Judg- 
ing from  our  own  feelings,  we  cannot  wonder  that 
the  Jews  viewed  the  spiritual  interpretation  of  their 
covenant  as  dishonoring  both  to  them  and  to  their 
God.  Therefore,  they  opposed  Jesus.  Nor  can  we 
wonder  that  the  disciples  persisted  in  misreading  His 
message  and  even  tried  to  make  Him  king  in  defiance 
of  His  word;  and  after  Calvary  bewailed  their  trust 
in  One  who  seemed  able  to  redeem  Israel. 

Tradition  is  hard  to  conquer.  Opinions  long  cher- 
ished are  surrendered  only  by  a  revolution  of  heart. 
It  needs  a  flood  of  light;  it  needs  profoundly  more,  it 
requires  a  new  and  captivating  affection  reaching 
down  to  the  bottom  of  the  soul,  to  release  a  man  from 
the  bonds  of  an  unspiritual  faith.  Men  do  not  like  to 
alter  their  opinions;  it  seems  like  a  confession  of  un- 
manliness.  But  after  all  an  opinion  is  something  we 
have  conceived  and  not  a  truth  fixed  in  the  realms  of 


64.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

eternity.  I  have  read  that  a  venerated  judge  did  not 
fear  to  change  his  opinion  when  solid  argument  con- 
vinced him  of  the  correctness  of  another  view.  True 
manhood  comes  out  there.  It  is  not  tenacity  of  belief 
but  openness  of  mind  that  forms  the  basis  of  substan- 
tial faith  and  spiritual  progress.  Judas  was  wrong  in 
holding  to  the  idea  of  Messianic  splendor.  Christ  did 
not  intend  to  ride  triumphantly  up  the  Appian  Way 
into  the  Forum  and  claim  the  Roman  Eagles  for  his 
own.    "  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world." 

We  need  to  analyze  the  traditional  temper  that  binds 
us.  Every  believer,  every  church  is  infected  partially 
by  the  spirit.  If  the  church  does  not  adapt  itself  tG 
changing  conditions,  if  it  refuses  to  meet  the  Mace- 
donian call  for  service  beyond  the  borders  of  the  home- 
land, if  it  shuts  its  eyes  to  the  miseries  of  slum  and  ten- 
ement, as  not  being  the  work  of  the  church  in  the 
fathers'  opinion  and  therefore  not  in  ours,  if  it  speaks 
in  its  worship  the  language  of  another  century  or  in  its 
creed  the  outworn  terms  of  an  old  controversy,  if  it 
leaves  to  the  public  press  the  discussion  of  questions, 
that  concern  the  moral  life  of  the  nation,  on  the 
ground  that  the  Constitution  separates  church  and 
state  and  prescribes  the  subjects  proper  to  each,  if  it 
receives  the  gifts  of  wealthy  philanthropists  and  utters 
no  condemnation  on  the  methods  by  which  much  of  the 
wealth  is  procured,  if  it  allows  the  education  of  its 
children  to  pass  entirely  out  of  its  hands  and  over 
into  the  clock-work  system  of  public  institutions, — if, 
in  a  word,  the  church  erects  into  an  idolatry  the  mem- 
ory of  the  Past,  and  will  not  meet  the  glorious  oppor- 
tunity of  the  Present,  then  we  should  look  with  keen 
scrutiny  at  the  answer  of  Jesus  to  His  Rabbinical 
disciple :  "  If  a  man  loves  me,  he  will  keep  my  words." 


SPIRITUAL  MOULDS  55 

The  cure  of  all  traditionalism  is  a  passion  for  Christ. 
Wrong  ideas  though  adorned  with  illustrious  names 
find  their  solvent  there.  Misplaced  emphasis  is  cor- 
rected at  His  touch.  The  only  place  to  get  the  truly 
spiritual  vision  of  life  and  service  is  at  the  feet  of  the 
Saviour.  When  you  hear  with  Luther  the  voice  of 
justification  by  faith  and  not  by  works,  when  you 
stand  with  Zinzendorf  before  the  form  of  the  crucified 
Christ,  when  with  Livingstone  you  catch  sight  of  the 
teeming  multitudes  of  Africa,  going  down  the  road  of 
utter  despair,  then  all  tradition  is  flung  to  the  winds; 
then  you  behold  the  real  pulsing,  saving  power  of 
heaven;  then  you  can  repeat  the  flaming  motto  of 
Henry  Martyn : — "  Let  me  burn  out  for  Christ." 

Three  spiritual  moulds  are  cast  in  the  persons  of 
Thomas,  Philip,  and  Jude.  Do  they  symbolize  your 
own  ?  If  so,  I  invite  you  to  seize  the  gold  in  them  and 
consume  the  alloy.  Address  your  toil  to  the  most 
glorious  purpose  conceived  for  mankind  and  by  a 
mighty  output  of  faith  shape  your  own  life  after  the 
holy  pattern  of  the  blessed  Lord. 


IV 
THE  DUPLICATE  VISION 

John  14 :9.  "  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath 
seen  the  Father, — and  how  sayest  thou  then, 
Show  us  the  Father?  " 

THE  faculty  of  sight  is  the  greatest  treasure  of 
the  human  body.  Without  it  space,  saving  that 
which  may  lie  within  the  sweep  of  the  hand,  is 
eliminated.  Without  it  the  glorious  colors  that  mingle 
in  the  belted  arch  of  heaven  convey  no  meaning  to  the 
mind.  If  the  eye  cannot  see,  to  what  purpose  shall  we 
rehearse  the  details  of  the  picture,  the  rich  back- 
ground, the  lights  playing  on  tree  and  house,  the 
shimmering  stream,  and  the  herd  browsing  lazily  in 
the  meadows?  If  sight  be  denied,  how  shall  one  paint 
in  words  so  exquisitely  the  mother's  face  that  its  pre- 
cious lineaments  may  shine  lifelike  and  real  in  the  soul 
of  the  child?  What  is  more  pathetic  than  a  blind 
man's  attempt  to  read  the  expression  of  his  friend's 
face  by  passing  his  hand  over  its  features? 

I  feel  certain  that  Jesus  gave  to  this  sense  the  same 
superlative  emphasis  that  we  do;  for  He  lived  in  a 
land  where  blindness  came  commonly  from  the  pierc- 
ing glare  and  the  sifting  sand.  His  gentle  touch  re- 
leased many  from  this  dread  thraldom,  and  they 
looked  up  to  His  kindly  eyes  with  waves  of  gratitude 
from  the  new-kindled  light  in  their  own.  It  is  this 
fact  which  makes  the  words  of  the  text  glow  with 
preternatural  luster.   We  can  see  Christ  the  Man  of 

56 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  57 

Nazareth  girded  with  manly  grace,  and  in  Him  we 
can  detect  the  majesty  of  God  who  is  revealed  as  the 
Father  of  i 


We  are  invited  to  inspect  the  Person  of  Jesus. 

It  is  the  settled  judgment  of  science  that  sight  pro- 
ceeds along  three  successive  paths.  We  shall  follow 
them  in  our  study  of  Him  whom  the  text  brings  to 
our  notice. 

Sight,  in  the  first  place,  consists  in  simple  observa- 
tion. The  eye  of  the  child  begins  with  this  just  as 
soon  as  the  orbit  of  vision  is  fixed.  All  inquiries  as 
to  natural  order  have  their  starting-point  in  the  gath- 
ering of  facts.  If  you  wish  to  know  the  structure  of 
the  earth  beneath  its  crust,  you  must  open  your  eyes 
to  see.  You  must  observe  the  arrangement  of  the 
different  strata,  whether  they  lie  one  upon  the  other 
in  regular  sequence  or  have  been  acted  on  by  some 
inward  force  which  has  twisted  the  layers  out  of 
shape,  broken'  great  masses  of  rock,  and  piled  them 
up  in  chaotic  masses  in  entire  disregard  of  geomet- 
rical symmetry.  This  is  the  beginning  of  scientific 
knowledge.  It  is  very  different  from  the  method  of 
the  famous  French  thinker,  Buffon,  who  sat  in  his 
lofty  study  and  constructed  a  world  out  of  his  own 
ingenious  reasonings.  We  demand  something  simpler 
and  at  the  same  time  more  agreeable  to  the  facts.  He 
who  will  not  work  by  the  primary  method  of  observa- 
tion does  not  deserve  a  place  in  the  workshop  of  true 
science. 

We  demand  the  same  course  in  the  sphere  of  reli- 
gion. We  insist  that  men  must  see  in  order  to  know. 
The  Christian  religion  does  not  fear  to  square  its 


58  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

principles  by  the  commonest  rules  of  science.  Jesus 
pursues  this  plan;  He  tells  His  disciples  that  they 
had  seen  Him,  and  seeing  is  the  first  portal  to  the 
hall  of  truth.  What  had  they  seen?  What  had  fixed 
the  intent  gaze  of  their  eye?  We  shall  go  with  them 
to  the  Jordan  valley  and  get  with  them  the  first  look 
on  Christ.  John  pointed  Him  out  as  a  Stranger  to 
the  multitude,  indeed  a  Stranger  to  him  until  the 
divine  Spirit  marvelously  unsealed  his  eyes.  John 
said  that  he,  the  forerunner,  was  not  worthy  to  stoop 
down  and  loose  the  latchet  of  the  Stranger's  shoes. 
Finally,  John  exclaimed,  "  Behold  the  Lamb  of  God 
that  taketh  away  the  sin  of  the  world !  "  "  This  is  He 
of  whom  I  spake ;  he  that  cometh  after  me  is  preferred 
before  me,  for  he  was  before  me."  The  young  men 
from  Galilee  lifted  up  their  eyes,  as  Leah  and  Rachel 
lifted  them  up  when  Jacob  came.  They  looked  and 
saw;  saw  what,  saw  whom?  He  was  dressed  as  a 
citizen  of  that  country,  the  simple  garment  over  His 
shoulders  and  the  sandals  on  His  feet.  He  did  not 
espouse  the  coarse  clothing  of  the  Baptist,  for  His 
mission  was  not  as  his.  He  did  not  eat  the  uncooked 
food  of  the  desert,  locust  and  wild  honey;  for  His 
place  was  among  men,  not  apart  from  their  busy  and 
careworn  haunts.  He  appeared  to  be  the  counterpart 
of  His  fellows,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  primary  fact 
pleased  the  fancy  of  His  admirers.  So  they  followed 
Him. 

Now,  a  difference  began  to  emerge ;  He  did  not  walk 
precisely  as  they  did.  Their  gaze  became  more  pene- 
trating and  more  detailed.  Every  man  differs  from  his 
neighbor  in  his  particular  mannerism.  You  don't 
need  to  see  the  face  of  certain  persons;  you  can  tell 
who  they  are  by  the  tilt  of  the  figure,  by  the  shrug  of 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  59 

the  shoulders,  by  the  swing  of  the  body.  I  can  im- 
agine, they  gave  a  watchful  look  to  every  movement  of 
the  Man  who  preceded  them  by  a  few  paces.  They 
wanted  to  see  how  He  "  carried  himself,"  as  the 
French  say.  Then,  they  saw  Him  turn  about  and  wait 
for  them  to  approach.  It  was  a  critical  moment  for 
the  inquirers,  though  the  significance  of  the  meeting 
did  not  break  on  them  at  once.  It  might  just  be  that 
as  they  neared  this  Person  the  glances  grew  hesitant, 
wavering,  embarrassed.  Why  had  they  come  at  all? 
It  is  never  fair  to  intrude  on  the  privacy  of  another. 
Nor  could  they  be  at  all  sure  from  the  word  of  the 
Preacher  that  the  mission  were  worthy  of  the  solemn 
pursuit  of  a  Jew.  But  they  kept  on,  entered  His  pres- 
ence, sat  down  and  talked  with  Him.  The  observation 
grows  more  exact;  now  they  can  note  the  features  of 
His  face,  the  Face  that  a  host  of  inspired  artists  have 
tried  to  recover  to  their  canvas, — all  beauty  that 
human  flesh  can  congregate  in  one,  all  spiritual 
thought  that  ever  blood  and  nerve  could  print  on  mat- 
ter,— they  saw  it  all  in  Jesus'  face  but  knew  nothing 
as  yet  of  its  eternal  meaning.  They  had  fulfilled  the 
first  element  of  the  new  religion, — they  had  seen  the 
Lord ! 

We  insist  that  men  must  see  in  order  to  know  the 
truth.  The  gateway  to  faith  is  an  appeal  to  the  Per- 
son of  the  Christ.  Nothing  else  will  do.  If  you  be- 
gin with  the  church  you  must  tell  what  the  church 
stands  for  and  why  it  has  a  right  to  claim  the  suffrage 
of  mankind.  If  you  instance  a  sacrament  as  the 
initial  step  in  faith  you  must  read  out  the  truth  em- 
bodied there,  or  men  will  tell  you,  it  is  a  bare  piece  of 
matter,  bread  that  perishes,  and  a  few  drops  of  water 
that  are  spilled  upon  the  ground.    If  you  hold  up  a  dog- 


60  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ma  which  the  faithful  have  believed  you  will  get  answer 
that  it  is  the  excogitation  of  men's  reason  and  not 
living  truth.  We  must  begin  with  a  Person;  we  must 
set  our  minds  to  get  a  discreet  and  absorbing  look  at 
Him. 

In  order  to  do  this  we  need  the  records  of  the  past. 
Tradition  that  passes  from  mouth  to  mouth,  doctrines 
that  are  communicated  from  one  memory  to  another 
will  not  suffice.  Even  the  sculptured  form  of  a  living 
master  as  enshrined  in  the  sacred  edifices  of  Buddhism 
palls  upon  the  adoration  of  the  ages.  We  must  see  the 
Face,  we  must  hear  the  Voice  of  the  Teacher.  We 
must  follow  Him  on  errands  of  mercy,  see  His  holy 
hand  lifting  up  the  accursed,  feel  His  touch  on  fevered 
brow,  on  sightless  eyes,  on  disjointed  limbs.  Where 
can  we  get  so  intimate  a  view  of  Him  save  in  the  Bible? 
Hence,  to  understand  the  "  Fact  of  Christ "  you  must 
observe.  Much  of  the  listless,  inert  experience  of  the 
church  is  due  to  the  absence  of  Bible  vision.  Would 
you  know  Christ  better,  then  look,  look,  look  at  Him! 
In  the  second  place,  sight  brings  identification.  It  is 
very  difficult  to  identify  an  object  by  the  faculty  of 
touch.  Did  you  ever  try  it?  Go  into  a  dark  room, 
and  attempt  to  pick  out  a  small  box  among  a  number 
of  objects  of  the  same  general  shape.  You  would  have 
to  identify  it  by  some  particular  break  on  the  sur- 
face, and  even  then  you  might  come  out  with  a  serious 
doubt  in  the  mind.  But  the  eye  usually  determines  at 
once  the  identity  of  the  thing.  For  this  reason  sight  is 
a  much  more  authoritative  ground  of  evidence  in  court 
procedure  than  either  touch  or  hearing.  I  am  aware 
that  the  power  of  identification  is  not  the  same  in  all 
persons.  Some  eyes  are  sharp  and  sure;  some  minds 
behind  the  eyes  arrive  at  a  clearer  decision.    But  taken 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  61 

altogether  we  may  hold  that  sight  gives  us  the  best 
basis  for  establishing  the  identity  of  a  person.  It  did 
so  in  the  experience  of  the  disciples.  When  Jesus 
called  them  by  the  Lake  of  Galilee  they  recognized 
Him  as  the  very  Teacher  whom  John  had  recom- 
mended. When  He  came  to  them  in  the  midnight 
storm,  walking  on  the  wind-driven  sea,  they  were  at 
first  terrified  lest  an  evil  spirit  were  about  to  con- 
sume them  but  sank  into  repose  at  the  sound  of  His 
voice  and  the  sight  of  His  face.  And  when,  the  resur- 
rection past,  the  re-embodied  Lord  exposed  His  hands 
and  side  for  their  scrutiny  then  they  rejoiced  with 
joy  unspeakable  and  full  of  glory. 

I  need  not  cite  further  examples.  It  was  not  some 
remarkable  power  that  caused  them  to  retain  so  vivid 
an  impression  of  the  divine  Person.  Memory  did  it  for 
them,  and  memory  can  do  it  for  us.  It  is  a  plain,  un- 
varnished fact  that  the  Christ  in  the  Gospels  perpetu- 
ates Himself  in  the  Acts  of  the  church.  The  portrait 
is  the  same.  The  portrait  has  never  changed  from  the 
day  of  Calvary  to  this  day  of  grace.  The  power  that 
He  wielded  in  His  Palestinian  life  is  wielded  now  in 
His  universal  life,  that  is,  His  life  in  Europe,  in 
America,  in  the  islands  of  the  sea.  Then  He  awoke 
the  sleeping  forces  of  nature  and  commanded  their 
obedience.  Now  He  grips  the  dormant  powers  of  the 
soul  and  ushers  us  into  eternal  life.  Then  He  opened 
the  blinded  eyes  whose  living  nerve  had  been  cut.  Now 
He  tears  off  the  blinding  prejudices  of  the  heart  and 
unveils  the  heights  of  holiness.  It  is  the  same  Christ, 
— only  His  Form  is  unseen  and  His  message  is  now 
strictly  spiritual.  We  are  wonted  to  the  change  that 
takes  place  in  a  great  man's  career.  Once,  as  with 
Milton,  the  arena  of  state  is  his  field,  and  he  argues 


62  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

for  freedom  of  thought  with  Herculean  strokes.  Then 
a  shift  in  the  scene  uncurtains  the  quieter  stage; — a 
man  alone,  sitting  behind  the  thick  darkness  of  closed 
eyes,  but  pouring  out  themes  and  thoughts  and  sub- 
lime tropes  that  have  held  the  world  under  magic 
spell.  Milton  has  not  altered ;  the  mighty  vigor  of  his 
soul  is  unquenched.  In  the  council-chamber  or  by  the 
poet's  table  he  is  the  Voice  of  honor  and  liberty  and 
truth.  My  friend,  you  may  not  behold  your  Christ 
with  seeing  eyes  now;  but  the  march  of  His  victorious 
standard  is  heard  in  the  land,  and  the  cross  that  sup- 
ported His  dying  Frame  once  is  now  the  herald  of 
spiritual  emancipation  for  the  entire  race  of  men. 

The  vision  of  the  eye  has  a  third  function,  viz.,  to  in- 
cite the  mind  to  reflection.  We  are  not  content  to 
look  on  a  man  as  we  look  on  a  stone.  There  is  much  to 
learn  about  the  composition  of  a  physical  body,  its 
inorganic  elements,  how  they  were  gathered  into  this 
particular  group,  what  place  the  stone  has  in  the 
arrangement  of  all  nature,  and  of  what  use  it  may  be 
to  civilized  society.  But  when  we  come  to  the  human 
person  we  get  larger  thoughts.  We  perceive  an  object 
that  does  not  remain  the  same,  that  grows  and  grows 
by  laws  of  its  own.  We  catch  the  strain  of  purpose; 
we  detect  the  setting  of  means  to  an  end.  We  see  the 
evidences  of  an  inner  impulse  guided  by  none  of  the 
laws  so  familiar  in  the  life  of  tree  or  horse.  In  other 
words,  a  -Person  steps  out  of  the  curtained  recess 
into  the  presence  of  the  observer.  We  need  not  spec- 
ulate how  Jesus  the  Christ  unfolded  His  splendid 
powers  of  mind  to  the  gaze  of  His  disciples,  nor  how 
much  they  in  their  childlike  faith  understood.  We 
have  a  thousand  items  to  prove  that  He  impressed 
them  and  the  surging  crowds  as  not  another  teacher 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  63 

in  His  day  did.  "  He  spake  with  autliority  and  not  as 
the  scribes;  He  spake  as  never  man  spake;  we  have 
seen  strange  things  today,"  when  the  palsied  man  was 
healed ; — and  "  no  man  durst  ask  Him  any  more  ques- 
tions." The  intellectual  power  of  the  Lord  was 
recognized. 

The  moral  quality  was  recognized  by  His  comrades, 
too.  They  knew  that  He  differed  here  from  His  con- 
temporaries by  the  width  of  heaven's  span.  When 
Peter  saw  the  miraculous  draught  of  fishes  he  was 
moved  not  so  much  by  the  exertion  of  power  as  by 
the  holy  character,  which  alone  would  have  a  right  to 
receive  such  endowment.  Even  the  unbelieving  Jews 
could  not  restrain  the  exclamation :  "  How  can  a  man, 
that  is  a  sinner  do  such  miracles?"  Men  got  some- 
where near  the  truth  by  the  sight  of  wonders.  But  they 
could  not  then  and  cannot  now  reach  the  goal  of  per- 
fect vision,  until  they  see  a  soul  changed  from  sin  to 
safety  by  the  overshadowing  love  of  the  Master.  Then 
faith  steps  in  and  supplants  sight,  and  the  unshaded 
glory  of  Christ  becomes  our  present  possession. 

I  am  constrained  to  believe  that  we  need  faith  the 
"  sixth  sense "  now.  Religion  may  begin  with  sight, 
but  it  cannot  end  there.  There  is  no  scientific  demon- 
stration to  the  truth  of  a  redeemed  soul.  You  must 
experience  redemption.  Argument  and  precept,  mir- 
acle and  prophecy  fulfilled  are  not  food  to  the  hungry 
soul.  You  must  get  Christ  Himself,  the  dying  Lord, 
the  beneficial  Sacrifice.  You  must  get  some  taste  of 
the  mystic's  piety;  you  must  think  your  spirit  into 
His;  you  must  have  Him  for  your  Guest;  you  must 
walk  with  Him,  and  talk  with  Him,  and  think  with 
Him.  You  will  not  press  His  sacred  Person  in  holy 
fancy  to  your  own,  as  St.  Francis  of  Assisi  did;  so 


64.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

that  the  wounds  of  Christ,  men  said,  left  their  marks, 
inerasable  Stigmata,  on  his  hands  and  feet.  But  you 
will  see  Him  so  plainly,  hear  His  commands  so  ex- 
actly, follow  His  steps  so  closely,  as  in  time  to  make 
your  friends  think  they  stand  in  the  very  presence 
of  the  divine  Saviour.  That  is  the  way  to  see  Him. 
That  is  the  way  to  reflect  on  Him. 

"  All  my  capacious  powers  can  wish, 
In  Thee  doth  richly  meet; 
Not  to  mine  eyes  is  light  so  dear. 
Nor  friendship  half  so  sweet." 

II 

We  have  now  caught  the  vision  of  Christ;  but  the 
vision  is  duplicate : — "  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath 
seen  the  Father."  It  is  an  astounding  affirmation, 
falling  from  the  lips  of  a  man.  Either  he  who  makes 
it  is  deranged  or  he  must  have  some  good  grounds  for 
making  it.  The  whole  life  of  Jesus  testifies  to  His 
sanity.  No  man  ever  faced  the  profound  truths  of  re- 
ligion more  deliberately  than  He.  No  man  ever 
handled  them  more  deftly.  And  no  man  was  ever  so 
free  from  logical  devices  to  obscure  the  terms  in  debate. 
Moreover,  no  race  resisted  so  resolutely  as  His  own 
every  attempt  to  bring  God  down  to  the  level  of  the 
earth.  We  are  warranted,  therefore,  in  giving  strict 
attention  to  the  words  as  Jesus  used  them.  "  He 
that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the  Father"  can  mean 
generically  but  one  thing,_that  between  God  and  Him 
there  existed  a  correspondence  not  found  between  God 
and  other  human  beings.  It  is  our  business  to  unravel 
the  mystery,  so  far  as  the  sublime  sentiment  permits. 

The  words    may    denote    Resemblance, — Christ  re- 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  65 

sembles  God  in  certain  qualities,  qualities  of  spirit,  of 
course,  for  Deity  possesses  no  physical  parts,  Greek 
and  Hebrew  are  at  one  in  that.  Such  resemblance  is 
not  strange  in  common  life.  "  How  much  he  looks 
like  his  father ! "  You  stop  to  scrutinize  the  young 
man's  person.  Yes,  he  walks  with  the  same  gait,  swings 
his  arms,  holds  his  head,  moves  his  body,  just  exactly 
as  the  older  man.  The  contour  of  face  is  singularly 
like,  too ;  there  is  the  bold  forehead,  the  aquiline  nose, 
the  square,  strong  chin.  Then,  you  ask  about  the 
mental  traits  and  find  a  similarity  there.  The  father 
has  a  determined  way  of  taking  hold  of  any  subject, 
and  his  son  unconsciously  exhibits  the  same.  Four 
men  of  national  reputation  from  one  parsonage  in  the 
Berkshires, — the  father  a  minister  of  high  intelligence, 
strong  will,  great  power  of  persuasion  in  speech,  and 
deep  piety;  and  each  son  carrying  his  share  of  resem- 
blance to  that  honored  father  into  his  own  avenue 
of  service, — that  is  nature's  answer  to  the  problem  of 
heredity.  In  a  certain  sense  it  might  be  true  to  say, 
he  that  hath  seen  Dudley,  Stephen,  Cyrus,  or  Henry 
Field,  hath  seen  their  father  David. 

I  shall  not  press  this  argument  too  far,  for  it  has  its 
perils.  And  yet  all  agree  that  looking  from  the  con- 
dition of  manhood  the  most  striking  element  in  the  life 
of  Jesus  is  its  utter  sinlessness.  And  what  nearer 
approach  can  one  make  to  God?  More  than  that;  if 
sinlessness  be  an  actual  fact  in  Christ's  life,  must  we 
not  ask,  if  there  be  not  some  other  item  that  removes 
Him  from  a  possible  classification  with  men?  For,  no 
other  instance  is  on  record — granting  the  sinlessness 
exists — no  other  instance  is  on  record  of  a  human  life 
unstained  by  actual  sin  or  unshadowed  by  possible  sin. 
And  going  further,  no  other  case  is  known  where  abso- 


66  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

lute  freedom  from  the  hint  of  sin  or  the  suspicion  of 
remorse  enters  as  a  distinct  and  unqualified  experience 
of  the  mind.  Ullmann  contends  that  even  the  idea  of 
untempered  holiness  never  entered  the  consciousness 
of  the  heathen  world,  and  they  certainly  never  con- 
structed a  figure  for  which  the  most  primary  claim  of 
sinlessness  was  made.  But,  here  is  the  idea  perfectly 
realized  in  a  historic  Person,  to  whose  faultless  life 
even  His  enemies  had  to  bear  witness.  Not  only  is 
His  life  free  from  sin,  which  is  a  negative  state,  but 
He  is  also  governed  by  the  only  supreme  profusion  of 
love  known  to  the  world,  which  is  the  positive  quicken- 
ing of  character  by  the  highest  power  of  the  divine 
Mind.  If  Christ  be  all  this,  may  we  not  say,  He  is  like 
God  in  some  glorious  sense,  which  is  not  even  hinted  at 
in  any  human  resemblances? 

Again,  the  words  of  Christ  may  mean  that  He  came 
to  represent  God,  and  thus  "  he  that  hath  seen  me  hath 
seen  the  Father."  He  often  spoke  of  being  sent  by 
God  as  an  ambassador  is  sent  by  the  King.  It  is  cor- 
rect to  say  that  when  you  see  the  legate  you  see  the 
prince;  but  after  all  it  is  correct  only  by  a  figure  of 
speech.  The  actual  person  of  the  prince  may  be  ten 
thousand  miles  away.  The  King  of  England  might 
have  remained  in  his  palace  at  London  and  his  minister 
of  state  might  have  received  the  imperial  crown  at  the 
hands  of  the  Indian  people.  He  would  have  been  truly 
crowned,  because  the  Person  of  the  sovereign  is  for  the 
time  in  thought  substituted  for  the  person  of  his  mes- 
senger. But  setting  aside  the  lack  of  reality  in  the 
figure  it  is  clear  that  Jesus  possessed  and  exercised  cer- 
tain rights  that  belonged  to  divinity.  No  one,  for 
example,  none  but  Jesus  ever  essayed  to  forgive  sins  in 
his  own  name.    "  Jesus  Christ  maketh  thee  whole,"  is 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  67 

the  dictum  of  Peter.  "  I  say  by  the  grace  given  unto 
me,"  is  the  manner  of  St.  Paul.  But  Jesus  said,  "  I  say 
unto  thee,  Thy  sins  be  forgiven  thee."  "  The  son  of 
man  hath  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins."  I  don't 
wonder  that  the  assembled  Rabbis  were  shocked  and 
alarmed  at  this  apparently  blasphemous  talk.  They 
had  kept  their  skirts  impeccably  clean,  and  now  should 
they  permit  this  intruder  to  traduce  the  sanctity  of 
their  law? 

The  point  is  just  this :  How  far  did  Jesus'  authority 
extend?  If  He  simply  represented  God  would  He  be 
justified  in  using  the  first  personal  pronoun  in  His 
discourses?  Could  He  handle  so  delicate  a  subject 
without  a  reference  to  His  Sovereign's  desires?  Could 
He  say  with  any  shade  of  truth  that  He  had  authority 
in  heaven  and  earth,  and  that  He  commissioned  His 
disciples  to  preach  Him  as  a  saving  Lord  ?  If  He  does 
so  then  He  usurps  the  place  of  the  Sovereign  and 
grasps  the  scepter  in  His  own  hands.  Yet  this  very 
thing  Jesus  does,  and  in  our  heart  of  hearts  we  do  not 
resent  His  words.  Why?  Tell  me,  ye  who  have 
soothed  your  aching  hearts  in  His  embrace ;  tell  me,  ye 
who  have  sat  down  at  His  feet  and  heard  the  words 
sweeter,  gentler,  more  searching  than  ever  tongue  of 
man  uttered;  tell  me,  ye  who  have  left  home  and 
friends  and  bounded  the  confines  of  the  earth  with  your 
labors — why  have  ye  accepted  Him,  if  not,  because  ye 
believed  Him  to  be  incarnate  God  and  not  a  prophetic 
emissary  of  the  throne ! 

Look  again:  the  union  of  Christ  with  God  is  some- 
thing more  than  we  have  yet  suggested.  The  terms  of 
the  verse  are  not  satisfied  with  either  interpretation, 
helpful  and  stimulating  as  they  are.  We  are  bound 
to  seek  a  closer  union,  but  just  how  it  may  be  defined 


68  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

in  human  speech,  who  can  tell  ?  "  I  and  my  Father  are 
one," — does  that  subtend  a  metaphysical  oneness  which 
seems  to  mean  that  two  persons  are  subtly  mixed  in 
one  indiscoverable  Being?  I  do  not  know.  Who  does 
know?  It  is  easy  to  call  in  analogies  to  aid  us.  The 
oak  is  present  in  the  acorn,  and  thus  Christ's  deity  is 
in  His  earthly  Person.  The  ray  of  the  sun  is  a  part 
of  the  sun  itself,  and  he  who  sees  the  ray  has  no  need 
to  search  for  the  sun ;  he  knows  it  is  somewhere  in  the 
firmament.  Hence  the  ray  and  the  sun  are  the  same. 
But  how  far  have  we  advanced  the  frontier  of  religious 
faith?  Of  what  use,  I  ask,  are  the  piled-up  phrases  of 
the  Nicene  Creed  in  framing  an  idea  of  the  divine 
Christ— 

"  Born  of  the  Father,  of  one  nature  with  Him ;  that  is,  of  the 
substance  of  God, — God  of  God,  Light  of  Light,  very  God  of  very 
God,  begotten  not  made"? 

He  Himself  seems  to  be  lost  in  the  labyrinth  of  words. 
Certainly  the  tender  Saviour  withdraws  into  imper- 
sonal abstraction  at  the  touch  of  so  mystifying  an 
article. 

We  demand  something  with  the  breath  of  life  in  it, 
and  this  we  get  in  the  noble  comparison  He  always 
uses.  Father, — "  he  that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the 
Father."  Let  us  remember  that  the  words  of  Jesus  are 
spoken  of  His  earthly  state.  Did  He  intend  us  to 
suppose,  that  when  He  departed  and  the  Spirit  came. 
His  own  personal  existence  was  at  an  end?  Have  we 
mistaken  in  emphasizing  the  supermundane  personality 
of  Christ,  when  we  should  have  put  all  emphasis  on 
God,  who  is  manifest  by  His  Spirit's  presence?  There 
is  food  for  thought,  here.  It  cannot  be  that  the  unity 
of  God  is  today  broken  up  into  three  distinct  pieces, 


THE  DUPLICATE  VISION  69 

each  with  its  peculiar  office.  Were  that  true  we  should 
have  Tritheism,  and  the  aspersions  of  the  Moslem 
would  have  only  too  much  truth.  But  our  Trinity 
cannot  mean  that.  We  stand,  in  this  age,  for  a  seam- 
less Deity,  whose  wondrous  love  was  expressed  most 
perfectly  in  the  Person  of  the  earthly  Jesus.  We  are 
led  to  believe  that  the  relation  of  Jesus  to  God  was 
that  of  Son  to  Father,  and  that  He  carried  out  His 
office  with  the  most  scrupulous  care.  Indeed,  you 
cannot  understand  Jesus'  place  in  the  Trinity  apart 
from  this  relation.  It  is  that  relation  which  He, ad- 
duces in  our  present  verse : — "  he  that  hath  seen  me 
the  Son  hath  seen  God  the  Father."  That  is  the  sense 
of  the  language,  that  and  nothing  more. 

Examine  it  for  a  moment.  The  office  of  the  father 
in  the  Jewish  household  was  one  of  authority ;  the  office 
of  the  son  was  that  of  obedience.  You  can  tell  what 
the  nature  of  the  father  is  by  the  actions  of  the  son. 
Love  issuing  from  the  father's  heart  reverberates  in' 
the  son's.  Quiet  sympathy,  a  spirit  of  helpfulness  tend 
to  build  up  the  boy's  character  and  develop  the  best 
traits  of  manhood.  If  authority  requires  discipline  to 
be  administered,  it  is  administered.  There  is  no  com- 
plaint from  the  son  and  no  hesitation  with  the  father. 
The  life  of  both  is  complementary;  one  cannot  subsist 
without  the  other.  Jesus  says,  Whoever  observes  the 
exact  obedience  with  which  he  submits  to  the  Father's 
commands,  will  see  the  highest  fulfillment  of  the  divine 
law  and  the  finest  portrayal  of  divine  love. 

Have  we  seen  the  Face  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus? 
It  is  unspeakably  difficult  to  get  that  look.  Do  what 
we  will,  the  vision  presents  two  objects  still  to  our 
view.  Something  hinders  us  from  seeing  their  es- 
sential unity.     Did  you  ever  try  the  experiment  of 


70  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

holding  two  pencils  vertically  before  your  eye,  one  be- 
hind the  other,  with  a  white  surface  for  background? 
If  you  fix  your  eyes  on  the  first  pencil,  the  farther 
one  will  appear  double,  and  vice  versa.  Something  di- 
verts the  look,  and  each  eye  gets  its  own  impressions. 
The  case  is  parallel.  If  instead  of  looking  immediately 
at  God,  you  look  at  some  feeble  image  you  have  con- 
ceived of  what  He  ought  to  be,  then  the  Son  is  severed 
from  His  Father,  and  you  can  never  get  them  together. 
But  if  you  center  your  faith  on  the  indissoluble  unity 
of  the  Godhead,  then  the  Trinity  becomes  the  medium 
of  divine  expression,  modes  of  action,  channels  of 
priceless  love  to  a  waiting  world. 

Let  no  man  suffer  his  vision  to  rest  till  through 
Christ  it  pierces  to  the  heart  of  God  I 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH 

John  14 :10.     "  The  words  that  I  speak 
unto  you  I  speak  not  of  myself." 

JESUS  came  into  the  world  as  the  witness  to  truth. 
He  was  in  His  public  life  primarily  a  Teacher,  and 
the  serious  impression  He  made  on  penetrating 
minds  was  that  His  teaching  bodied  forth  elements  of 
truth  beyond  the  ken  of  ordinary  observers.  Popular 
fancy  was  caught  by  His  mastery  of  disease,  His  skill- 
ful dealing  with  occult  powers,  and  His  assertion  of  a 
right  to  rule  the  wind  and  wave.  The  miracle  paved 
the  road  to  temporary  success.  But  every  mighty  work 
was  after  all  a  sign,  the  outward  form  to  a  hidden 
principle,  a  sacrament  whose  terms  revealed  the  god- 
like wisdom  of  its  Doer. 

With  Truth,  therefore,  Jesus  had  to  do.  What 
truth?  whose  truth?  His  own  or  that  of  a  superior 
Mind?  We  are  at  times  confused  by  the  apparent 
contradiction  in  His  language.  Now  He  takes  all 
credit,  so  to  speak,  to  Himself.  "  Ye  have  heard  how  it 
hath  been  said  by  them  of  old  time  .  .  .  but  I  say 
unto  you."  "  He  that  heareth  my  words"  ;  "  heaven 
and  earth  shall  pass  away,  but  my  words  shall  not  pass 
away."  The  ring  of  personal  assurance  is  heard.  On 
the  other  hand.  He  turns  to  the  Father  in  heaven  and 
ascribes  all  truth  to  Him.  He  is  the  willing,  almost 
passive  medium  for  the  transmission  of  divine  thoughts 
to  men.    Which  of  these  is  the  correct  view  of  the 

71 


72  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Galilean  Prophet?  Well,  both  are  true  and  together 
frame  the  eternal  picture  of  the  Holy  Son.  Here  we 
emphasize  the  second,  which  traces  every  majestic 
truth  back  to  its  source  in  the  heart  of  God. 

Two  supplementary  themes  meet  us  in  the  text: 

1.  The  characteristics  of  the  words  of  Jesus;  and 

2.  Their  heavenly  origin. 


We  have  in  our  educational  code  a  double  test  to 
which  the  instructor  must  submit,  ere  he  stands  ac- 
cepted by  his  judges.  He  must  first  know  something 
worth  while  to  teach,  and  secondly,  he  must  have  the 
ability  to  impart  that  knowledge.  Jesus  satisfied  both 
qualifications  and  may  be  regarded  as  the  Preceptor 
Maximus  in  the  history  of  our  race.  We  are  at  pres- 
ent concerned  with  His  message  and  proceed  to  an- 
alyze its  salient  features. 

We  are  struck  at  once  with  the  note  of  authority 
that  sounds  in  every  sentence.  The  men  who  heard 
Him  in  His  initial  sermon  formed  the  same  opinion. 
That  opinion  settled  into  a  definite  judgment,  as  soon 
as  He  had  delivered  the  memorable  address  on  the 
mountainside.  Then  they  knew  that  a  "  prophet  had 
arisen"  in  Judah.  He  was  possessed  with  His  sub- 
ject; He  was  familiar  with  its  minutest  details;  He 
could  grasp  the  most  obscure  and  difficult  portion  of 
the  ancient  Law  and  shed  a  convincing  light  upon  its 
page.  The  scribes  could  do  this  in  some  measure  too. 
Yet  they  were  certainly  not  like  this  new  Preacher. 
The  difference  was  acutely  felt.  Men  went  home  from 
the  reading  of  the  sacred  Books,  glad  to  escape  from 
the  hum  of  droning  voices  and  the  smell  of  musty 
parchment.    But  they  left  the  base  of  the  Galilean  hill 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  73 

with  eye  aflame  and  pulses  stirred,  with  heart  beating 
loudly  and  the  conscience  wakened  from  a  long  sleep. 
They  had  heard  strange  things  that  day.  Up  to  Hat- 
tin's  summit  they  had  climbed  to  spend  a  lazy  after- 
noon in  curious  attention;  they  came  away  asking 
whence  this  man  was,  and  what  was  the  meaning  of  his 
words. 

Yes,  the  difference  between  Jesus  and  the  wisest 
scribe  was  like  a  chasm,  deep,  deep,  deep, — as  though 
it  could  not  be  bridged.  And  it  never  could  be  bridged ; 
it  was  the  difference  between  finitude  and  the  Infinite. 
At  length  they  pitched  on  its  terms;  they  discovered 
why  Jesus'  words  gripped  them  and  the  teachings  of 
their  oflScial  leaders  did  not.  Christ  spoke  with  au- 
thority and  the  scribes  with  a  slavish  adherence  to 
text.  Who  can  ever  get  the  swing,  the  charge,  the 
grand  exhilaration  of  truth,  if  he  must  rigidly  regard 
every  letter,  every  point,  and  every  inflection  in  the 
sentence;  if  he  must  be  incessantly  careful  lest  his 
interpretation  of  the  thought  should  differ  even  in- 
finitesimally  from  the  exposition  of  some  famous 
teacher?  The  curse  of  much  Bible  study  is  felt  just 
here.  We  dare  not  read  the  precious  verses  into  our 
heart's  flesh,  until  we  have  seen  how  they  fit  into  the 
statements  of  creed  or  received  opinion.  Jesus  had  no 
such  scruples;  He  brushed  aside  the  web  of  mystify- 
ing traditions  and  breathed  on  the  text  the  inspiration 
of  His  own  mind.  Hence,  His  message  leaped  like  a 
tongue  of  fire  into  the  soul  of  His  hearer.  He  con- 
quered prejudice  and  disarmed  criticism  by  sheer 
weight  of  ideas. 

And  what  were  those  ideas?  For  if  the  Lord's 
method  of  dealing  with  truth  differed  from  the 
scribes',  certainly  the  results  of  His  interpretation  were 


74  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

radically  opposed.  He  brought  forth  elements  that 
had  lain  for  centuries  unhonored  and  alone.  Many  of 
these  were  distasteful  to  the  religious  teachers  of  that 
day,  and  they  had  deliberately  turned  their  faces  away. 
Jesus,  however,  knew  them  to  be  essential  to  the  sav- 
ing of  the  soul.  Therefore,  He  uncovered  them  and  in 
fascinating  parable  and  sententious  saying  drove  them 
home  to  the  heart  of  the  people.  He  spoke  of  judg- 
ment, and  He  meant  that  the  divine  Hand  must  execute 
the  rigors  of  eternal  laws  without  let  or  hindrance. 
Over  against  this  He  spoke  of  mercy,  and  He  let  the 
penitent  sinner  have  a  look  into  the  gracious  heart  of 
God.  Then  He  lifted  up  His  own  Person  and  gathered 
about  it  all  the  prophetic  utterances  of  the  past,  all  the 
types  of  the  ceremonial  system,  all  the  hopes  of  Israel 
and  the  dumb,  unspoken  yearnings  of  the  world;  and 
standing  before  astonished  Jerusalem  exclaimed :  "  And 
I,  if  I  be  lifted  up,  will  draw  all  men  unto  me."  No 
mistake  in  such  language !  The  speaker  is  not  another 
Isaiah  with  a  wealth  of  promise  to  prostrate  Judah; 
not  a  Moses,  with  the  charm  of  the  new  law  in  his 
hands ;  this  Man  who  speaks  with  unchallenged  author- 
ity has  kinship  with  the  unopened  heavens.  His  mes- 
sage stills  the  voice  of  objection  into  silence. 

The  attitude  of  Jesus  is  a  direct  challenge  to  His 
church.'  We  need  the  note  of  authority  just  now.  In 
some  quarters  it  has  been  lost  or  forgotten  or  neg- 
lected. Whatever  numbness  is  felt  in  the  body  of 
the  church  is  due  to  the  lack  of  assurance.  We  must 
re-introduce  the  note  into  our  private  life  and  our 
public  worship.  We  must  repeat  the  words  of  the 
Saviour,  "  The  Son  of  man  is  come  to  seek  and  to 
save,"  and  clinch  them  by  belief  in  their  positive  cer- 
tainty.    The  authority  must  be  seated  in  his  word. 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  75 

Any  other  kind  of  authority  is  empty.  If  you  put  it 
in  your  priesthood  you  only  create  a  social  hierarchy 
that  will  on  occasion  burn  men  at  the  stake  or  ex- 
communicate them  from  the  blessings  of  eternity. 
Such  authority  is  for  pagan  societies,  not  for  those 
touched  by  the  Christian  ideal.  Nor  can  your  author- 
ity be  of  the  document  as  such,  the  appeal  to  a  subtly 
inspired  Book,  which  must  be  held  in  most  rigorous 
esteem  and  never  "  added  to  or  taken  from."  The  re- 
sult is  always  a  legalistic  religion  from  which  the 
spirit  has  fled  in  affright.  Your  authority  can  only 
be  the  living  word  of  Jesus;  the  church  must  rest 
upon  that.  We  must  preach  that,  preach  it  now, 
preach  it  with  new  and  conquering  energy.  We  have 
no  place,  the  world  has  no  place  for  an  invertebrate 
faith.  If  you  are  going  to  take  the  spine  out  of  re- 
ligion, take  the  carcass,  too! 

We  are  impressed,  once  more,  with  the  element  of 
conviction  in  Jesus'  teaching.  He  intended  to  do 
more  than  announce  His  rights;  He  meant  to  make 
men  acknowledge  them.  There  have  been  teachers 
who  did  not  teach  but  only  thought.  They  had  no 
care  to  persuade  others ;  let  them  work  out  the  scheme 
of  truth,  and  that  was  enough.  Others  might  adopt 
and  send  it  broadcast  over  the  earth, — if  they  chose. 
They  were  bent  on  seeing  the  matter  through  to  its 
legitimate  goal.  Christ  came  not  alone  to  produce 
truth  but  to  produce  men  who  obeyed  the  truth. 
He  made  His  appeal  to  the  intellect  and  to  the  con- 
science, the  two  supreme  forces  in  the  human  breast. 
When  men  get  within  the  magnetic  field  of  His  influ- 
ence they  must  not  go  away  unchanged.  And  they 
did  not  go  away  unchanged  under  the  spell  of  His 
preaching. 


76  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Observe  how  He  fed  the  mind  with  great  and  com- 
manding truths.  It  is  a  grave  mistake  to  suppose  that 
His  words  drew  simply  the  unlearned  or  the  emotional 
to  His  auditory.  His  ministry  was  remarkable, 
just  because  it  exerted  its  charm  over  every  grade 
of  mental  development.  I  am  citing  now  the  men  of 
recognized  intellectual  attainments,  those  who  were 
clad  in  the  fringed  robes  of  the  school,  those  who  bore 
rule  in  church  and  state,  and  again  those  quiet  folk 
in  the  heart  of  every  village  who  untaught  in  the  de- 
vices of  the  school  yet  knew  by  heart  the  promises  of 
the  ancient  Scriptures  and  looked  for  the  coming  of 
Messiah.  These  were  minds  of  power,  and  infant  food 
would  not  satisfy  them.  Jesus  taught  them  the  "  great 
things  of  the  law."  He  took,  for  instance,  the  idea  of  a 
kingdom,  which  had  hitherto  meant  a  sweep  of  earthly 
power  for  the  Jewish  nation,  and  transformed  it  into 
the  Kingdom  of  God.  How  clear,  how  incisive,  how 
broad-minded  those  parables  are!  It  is  the  dream  of 
a  statesman  that  is  here  detailed.  It  is  the  picture 
of  a  naturalist,  who  watching  intently  the  process  of 
growth  gives  to  spirit  as  well  as  matter  the  true  laws 
by  which  perfection  shall  be  won.  Surely  this  mes- 
sage is  not  to  children  only ;  it  is  meat  for  the  grown 
man. 

Or,  study  the  profounder  discussions  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel.  The  sermon  on  the  Bread  of  Life  has  excited 
more  intellectual  interest  than  the  most  intricate  prob- 
lems of  your  Athenian  masters.  No  man  can  under- 
stand it  by  a  casual  reading.  No,  say  not  that  it 
comes  naturally  from  the  miraculous  increase  of  bread 
across  the  Lake.  It  gets  its  text  there;  but  how  often 
in  sermons,  whether  preached  from  pulpit  or  press, 
the  text  is  the  main,  perhaps  the  only  thing  we  can 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  77 

carry  away.  Follow  the  discourse  of  the  Saviour,  as 
He  first  bids  them  to  beware  of  seeking  carnal  bless- 
ings and  forgetting  the  ideals  of  the  soul;  as  He  un- 
folds the  meaning  of  Manna  which  never  had  its  truth 
fully  told  till  He  came,  who  was  the  "  true  bread  "  ; 
as  He  depicts  the  saving  quality  of  this  bread  and  its 
grip  on  eternity, — until  the  disciples  exclaimed  in  de- 
spair of  understanding  it,  "  This  is  a  hard  saying;  who 
can  hear  it  ?  "  Of  course  it  is  hard  saying ;  so  is  every 
word  that  has  the  elements  of  eternal  truth  in  its  tex- 
ture. It  is  directed  to  the  matured  mind  of  the  race. 
It  echoes  the  challenge  of  Christianity  to  the  world. 
We  deal  not  with  the  trivial  schemes  that  occupy  other 
religions  or  the  emasculated  forms  of  our  own.  We 
are  not  concerned  with  beauty  of  ritual,  the  odor  of 
incense,  the  subdued  lights  of  the  windows,  or  the 
transmission  of  sacramental  virtue.  We  are  con- 
cerned with  the  deep  truths  of  religious  faith,  for  which 
no  minds  are  too  strong  and,  thanks  to  divine  wisdom, 
none  too  weak.  We  are  concerned  with  instructing 
the  intellect  of  the  race.  We  are  determined  to  make 
Christian  men,  the  progressive,  original,  influential 
citizens  of  the  nation.  No  other  religion  has  such 
nutritious  food  for  the  soul  as  this.  Hence,  we  de- 
mand that  Christ's  words  should  get  a  candid  hearing 
in  the  councils  of  earth. 

Observe,  also,  how  Jesus  wrought  on  the  conscience 
of  His  auditors.  He  drove  some  to  penitence  and 
others  He  drove  to  unrelenting  hatred.  The  purpose 
of  His  words  was  to  show  up  the  heart.  He  cared  noth- 
ing for  the  frills  of  religiosity  with  which  some  had 
adorned  their  persons.  Nor  did  He  regard  the  dis- 
repute which,  deserved  or  not,  the  community  has  set 
upon  the  offender.    He  went  to  Zaccheus,  dined  at  his 


78  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

home,  unveiled  as  with  a  surgeon's  probe  the  unscrup- 
ulous, hard,  covetous  fiber  of  his  soul,  and  extracted 
from  him  that  memorable  reply :  "  Lord,  if  I  have 
taken  anything  from  any  man  by  false  accusation,  I 
restore  him  fourfold."  That  is  the  plunge  of  truth 
into  conscience.  He  stood  undaunted  before  the 
haughty  Pharisees,  the  saints  of  that  day,  and  opened 
to  the  public  eye  the  catalogue  of  their  sins.  He  broke 
into  their  whited  sepulchers  and  showed  the  dead 
bones  of  dishonesty  and  cruel  oppression  to  widow 
and  orphan.  Would  that  the  Saviour's  word  might 
today  pierce  the  armor  which  cunning  and  deceit  have 
forged  upon  many  a  soul !  What  revelations  to  the 
family,  to  the  business  circle,  to  the  church!  If  such 
be  needed  then  we  pray  for  the  sword  of  the  Spirit, 
that  its  glistening  blade  may  fall  even  upon  our  own 
consciences  and  cut  off  the  silken  shimmer  of  pretended 
virtue  and  the  shreds  of  piety,  leaving  us  naked  to  the 
infilling  of  divine  truth. 

I  note  one  further  filament  in  the  words  of  Jesus, 
namely,  their  graciousness.  His  first  public  address 
bore  this  character,  and  it  was  woven  like  a  golden 
thread  through  all  His  teaching.  The  contrast  with 
the  other  teachers  of  the  times  was  indescribable. 
They  were  proud,  and  exclusive;  they  held  that  men 
who  had  no  learned  acquaintance  with  the  law  were 
not  better  than  the  brutes.  A  favorite  dictum  was: 
"  This  people  which  know  not  the  law  are  accursed." 
How  then  could  they  stand  as  leaders  in  religious 
thought?  It  is  the  same  feeling  that  shadow^s  the 
steps  of  the  Jewish  nation,  today;  only  now  it  is 
turned  against  them.  Now,  Russia  and  France  hurl 
all  the  contemptuous  epithets  in  their  lexicon  at  the 
unoffending  Hebrew  and  regard  him  as  beyond  the 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  79 

pale  of  redemption.  The  Master's  way  was  otherwise. 
He  had  love  and  peace  for  everyone,  high  or  low,  de- 
spised or  favored,  slave  or  free;  all  were  men  to  Him, 
all  possessed  the  most  priceless  jewel  on  earth,  an  im- 
mortal soul.  To  Mary  the  Magdalen  outcast  He  of- 
fered pardon;  to  Judas  who  was  about  to  sell  his 
Lord  He  handed  the  morsel  of  meat,  in  itself  an  op- 
portunity for  repentance;  to  the  dying  thief  with  a 
blackened  past  and  no  hope  for  the  future  He  un- 
barred the  gates  of  Paradise.  This  is  Grace  writ  large, 
flaming  in  coruscating  letters  of  invitation  over  the 
whole  wide  world.  This  is  mercy  such  as  no  other 
religious  creed  can  boast.  There  is  no  mercy  in  the 
hard  creed  of  Buddha, — a  thousand  Karmas,  or  rein- 
carnations, ere  the  soulless  Nirvana  is  reached.  There 
is  no  mercy  in  Mahomet's  faith,  where  the  Koran  and 
the  Sword  stand  as  hideous  alternatives.  The  words 
of  Christ  melt  with  glorious  love.  The  icy  depths  of 
sin  yield  to  their  cheery  touch.  Jesus  administers  the 
comforts  of  forgiveness  to  crushed  hearts.  What  un- 
speakable favor  is  His !  "  And  all  bare  Him  witness, 
and  wondered  at  the  gracious  words  which  proceeded 
out  of  His  mouth." 

II 

We  take  up  the  second,  and  main  theme  of  the  text, 
and  ask.  How  are  the  words  of  Jesus  in  very  fact  the 
words  of  God? 

It  is  a  matter  of  record  that  men  have  claimed  to 
utter  the  words  of  God  and  have  been  proven  de- 
ceivers or  self-deluded.  Hardly  a  year  passes  but  what 
some  new  sect  appears  to  pose  as  the  medium  of  divine 
wisdom,  and  thus  to  prey  on  the  credulity  and  purses 
of  their  victims.    We  must  remember,  therefore,  how 


80  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

easy  it  is  to  make  a  pretense  of  speaking  the  words 
of  God.  Such  a  course  is  avowedly  one  resorted  to  by 
less  enlightened  humanity.  The  stronger  minds  take 
one  of  two  other  courses;  either  they  depend  on  tra- 
dition as  the  source  of  truth,  or  else  they  seek  justi- 
fication at  the  bar  of  their  own  reason.  The  one  is 
the  custom  of  jurists,  the  other  of  philosophers.  The 
jurist  seeks  no  new  principle  in  deciding  a  case;  he 
discovers  the  facts  and  applies  the  code  as  already 
formulated.  The  philosopher,  on  the  other  hand,  recog- 
nizes no  truth  as  fixed;  he  insists  on  going  over  the 
whole  ground  of  reality  and  making  up  his  mind  for 
himself.  Every  religious  teacher  has  this  option  if  he 
cares  to  take  it.  Jesus  Himself  might  have  followed 
the  mode  of  His  contemporaries  and  interpreted  the 
sacred  books  literally.  Or  He  might  have  done  what 
Philo  and  other  Jews  in  Alexandria  were  doing, — 
make  those  books  square  with  the  deductions  of  Greek 
philosophy.  He  did  neither;  He  could  do  neither. 
He  came  not  to  say  what  Moses  had  said  and  cer- 
tainly not  what  Socrates  had  said.  He  came  to  say 
what  God  said.  In  other  words.  He  carried  the  stream 
of  Truth  back  to  its  source ;  or  reversing  the  order  He 
opened  the  infinite  reservoirs  to  let  the  torrents  of 
truth  rush  unchecked  into  the  consciousness  of  the 
world. 

Well,  the  mission  of  our  Lord  included  the  uttering 
of  the  holy  Oracles.  "  The  Father  which  sent  me  gave 
me  commandment,  what  I  should  say  and  what  I 
should  speak."  His  understanding  of  the  origin  of 
His  language  is  very  exact.  You  cannot  mistake  the 
tone,  here.  There  are  times  perhaps  when  His  doctrine 
is  too  profound  to  admit  of  clear  statement.  "I  and 
my  Father  are  one," — ^you  may  speculate  for  a  thou- 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  81 

sand  years  and  never  reach  the  rim  of  the  truth  here  im- 
bedded. But  the  fact  is  otherwise  in  His  present  report. 
We  get  at  the  meaning  because  the  Bible  abounds  in 
striking  precedents  for  the  statement.  Every  prophet 
speaking  out  of  the  certainty  of  experience  is  led  to 
exclaim :  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord."  Jeremiah,  a  man  of 
great  intellect,  a  serious  man  of  affairs,  a  wise  coun- 
cillor, and  as  brave  a  protagonist  of  truth  as  e^^^er 
spoke, — Jeremiah  says :  "  The  Lord  touched  my  mouth 
.  .  .  and  said  unto  me,  Behold  I  have  put  my  words 
in  thy  mouth."  The  mission  of  the  prophet  requires 
that  he  should  bear  the  divine  will  to  earth.  The 
mission  of  Christ  is  the  same  but  on  a  more  gigantic 
scale.  He  comes  as  the  Son  of  God,  not  simply  as  His 
representative.  Listen  to  the  opinion  found  in  the 
works  of  a  great  philosopher,  not  a  Christian : — "  Of 
him,  that  is,  Christ,  I  hold,  that  we  are  able  to  judge 
that  he  perceived  things  immediately,  adequately, 
truly ;  for  Christ,  though  he  also  appears  to  have  enun- 
ciated laws  in  the  name  of  God,  as  did  the  prophets, 
was  not  so  much  a  prophet,  as  he  was  the  mouth  of 
God."  (Spinoza.)  He  comes,  then,  as  the  ambassador 
from  the  court  of  heaven,  to  convey  the  wishes  of  the 
Holy  Lord.  Not  long  since,  the  Chinese  forces.  Im- 
perial and  Revolutionary,  held  a  conference  at  Shang- 
hai and  agreed  to  summon  a  council  for  the  empire, 
to  determine  what  form  of  government  should  be 
erected  after  the  abdication  of  the  Manchu  dynasty. 
The  latter  pronounced  for  a  Republic.  The  Imperial 
delegate  voted  to  the  same  effect.  On  his  return  to 
Peking  he  was  at  once  cashiered,  on  the  ground  that 
he  had  gone  beyond  his  instructions.  The  Sovereign's 
words  are  bound  to  be  repeated  in  whole  or  penalty 
ensues.    Jesus  stood  thus  for  God  and  spoke  His  words. 


82  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Again,  there  was  a  more  intimate  sense  in  which  He 
repeated  divine  truth.  You  have  noticed  how  a  child 
reproduces  the  inflection  of  voice,  the  gestures,  the 
very  sentences  of  a  parent, — sometimes  to  the  latter's 
discomfiture.  In  that  charming  tale  of  childhood, 
"  Little  Lord  Fauntleroy,"  the  author  depicts  the  naive 
confidence  of  the  boy  in  his  grim  and  cross-grained  old 
grandfather.  He  repeats  the  words  and  tones  of  the 
unworthy  example  and  declares  before  the  tenantry 
his  desire  to  be  just  like  the  detested  earl  on  his 
attaining  manhood.  The  imitative  faculty  of  the  child 
is  never  at  rest.  With  that  divine  and  holy  Father  be- 
fore His  eyes,  our  Lord  by  His  very  nature  had  to 
reflect  the  truth  of  God.  His  words  would  have  been 
false  and  out  of  joint,  had  they  assumed  any  form  save 
that  of  repetition.  He  could  with  no  affectation  de- 
clare :  "  The  words  that  I  speak  unto  you  I  speak  not 
of  myself." 

But  how,  we  ask,  can  Christ  or  any  of  the  prophets 
bring  the  word  of  God  to  men's  ears?  What  right 
have  we  to  hold  that  a  Revelation  is  possible?  I  am 
asking  now  a  hard  question,  and  the  wisdom  and  faith 
of  many  ages  have  been  lavished  on  the  answer,  I 
believe  that  God  has  spoken  to  the  world,  you  believe 
it,  the  church  holds  igt  as  fundamental  truth.  There 
are  vast  companies  of  men  who  deny  it  and  laugh  at 
us  for  our  unreasoned  faith.  But  is  this  faith  unrea- 
soned? We  know  how  sound  is  transmitted,  and  how 
you  can  hear  your  friend's  voice  three  thousand  miles 
away.  Science  has  recently  taught  us  to  send  mag- 
netic currents  across  oceans  without  the  guiding  wire. 
The  wireless  station  will  catch  the  waves  of  energy, 
discharged  from  the  instrument  on  the  other  shore. 
Fancy  almost  recoils  at  the  wonder  of  the  new  dis- 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  83 

covery.  But  the  explanation  is  very  simple  after  all; 
it  is  this :  "  Like  answers  unto  like."  I  maintain  that 
Revelation  is  possible,  because  God's  spirit  and  man's 
spirit  are  charged  with  the  same  energy  and  made  of 
the  same  stuff  and  respond  to  the  same  truth.  I  main- 
tain that  man  is  created  in  the  image  of  God  and  that 
if  you  can  communicate  with  another  soul  made  in  the 
same  mould,  there  is  not  the  slightest  reason  why  you 
should  not  hear  the  angels  sing,  and  feel  the  surge  of 
gracious  love  in  the  words  of  the  beloved  Son.  I  know 
that  from  the  viewpoint  of  science  the  soul  as  a  spirit- 
ual essence  is  nothing  but  an  assumption.  But  the 
contrary  idea  is  an  assumption  too  that  there  is  no 
real  personality  but  only  streams  of  consciousness 
coming  together,  and  making  us  think  that  we  are 
men! 

God  can  reveal  Himself;  He  can  and  does  find  kin- 
dred spirits  to  whom  He  communicates  His  truth.  But 
now  we  inquire.  Why  should  God  reveal  Himself  in  His 
Son?  Why  was  not  the  long  line  of  courageous  and 
inspired  prophets  enough  to  make  men  sure  of  His 
interest  in  them?  It  is  here  that  we  uncover  the 
supreme  purpose  of  Jesus'  life.  He  would  tell  enough 
of  God's  words  to  insure  safety  for  these  spirits,  from 
whose  faces  the  image  of  God  had  been  well-nigh 
erased  by  their  sin;  and  He  would  seal  His  testimony 
with  blood.  What  must  He  tell  ?  Will  a  few  words  be 
suflScient  ?  Will  He  utter  some  Delphic  oracle  and  then 
retire  into  the  shadow  of  the  temple?  For  an  answer, 
study  the  circle  of  His  teachings.  It  is  a  circle;  it 
stands  for  completeness.  Nothing  that  is  needed  to 
make  redemption  a  Fact  is  omitted.  The  human  mind 
has  often  attempted  to  compass  the  firmament  of  truth. 
Milton  will  record  in  entrancing  strophes  the  fall  of 


84  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

man  and  his  recovery.  Herbert  Spencer  will  seek  to 
bind  into  a  synthetic  philosophy  all  phases  of  human 
knowledge,  but  even  before  his  death  will  find  his 
fatiguing  work  relegated  to  the  topmost  shelf.  Christ 
is  not  concerned  with  putting  the  universe  into  shape. 
He  has  a  single  aim,  to  save  men  from  their  sins.  To 
accomplish  it  He  must  teach  two  things,  the  doctrine  of 
man  and  the  doctrine  of  God.  The  one  is  fully  de- 
tailed in  the  first  three  Gospels,  the  second  in  the 
Gospel  of  the  beloved  disciple.  Redemption  has  two 
phases,  a  life  to  be  lived  on  earth  and  the  cultivation 
of  the  eternal  hope.  The  Christian  life  is  made  up  of 
two  parts,  faith  and  works.  All  these  elements  are 
taught  by  Jesus  so  carefully,  so  concisely,  in  such  per- 
suasive language  that  we  wonder  how  any  hearer 
could  have  gone  away  unsatisfied.  And  yet  suppose 
He  should  stand  before  you  at  this  moment  in  the 
humble  garments  of  earth,  and  say  to  you  what  He 
said  to  the  Jews,  would  you  accept  His  words  at  their 
face  value  and  bow  down  at  once  and  worship?  You 
have  more,  a  thousand  times  more  than  the  original 
hearers  had;  you  have  the  entire  body  of  truth  inter- 
preted by  His  death.  His  resurrection,  and  the  long 
experience  of  the  church.  If  you  cannot  and  will  not 
accept  the  heavenly  origin  of  His  message  under  such 
circumstances,  I  fear  that  Christ  will  remain  for  you 
simply  the  Galilean  teacher,  the  citizen  of  Nazareth, 
and  nothing  more. 

Finally,  words  get  a  guaranty  from  the  character 
of  him  who  utters  them.  A  man  of  dishonest  life,  try 
he  never  so  hard,  will  not  succeed  in  dropping  pearls 
of  truth  from  his  lips.  The  pious  heart  does  not,  save 
in  a  fit  of  momentary  aberration,  express  itself  in 
profane  speech.    Words  and  works  are  tied  together; 


THE  GENESIS  OF  TRUTH  85 

they  are  the  joint  output  of  character.  Turning  to  the 
Lord  we  ask  how  these  heavenly  doctrines  accord  with 
His  life.  The  answer  is  unmistakable;  there  is  no 
blemish  there.  He  moves  among  His  associates  without 
soil.  To  His  challenge,  "  Which  of  you  convicteth  me 
of  sin?"  He  receives  no  answer.  This  is  He  who  is 
chosen  to  be  the  vehicle  of  God's  truth.  Isaiah  was  im- 
pure of  lip  and  dwelt  among  a  people  of  impure  lips. 
Paul  boiled  over  with  indignation  at  a  young  man's 
desertion,  and  allowed  the  uncharitable  word  to  es- 
cape. John,  quiet,  considerate,  gentle  John,  raged  at 
the  Samaritans'  rejection  of  his  Master  and  desired  to 
call  down  fire  and  consume  them.  But  Jesus'  words 
like  His  nature  breathed  the  spirit  of  divine  peace,  and 
communicated  the  elixir  of  divine  life.  Well  might  He 
be  called  by  His  dearest  friend  the  Word  of  God. 
"  And  the  Word  was  made  flesh,  and  dwelt  among  us, 
and  we  beheld  His  glory,  the  glory  as  of  the  only  be- 
gotten of  the  Father,  full  of  grace  and  truth." 

To  many  millions  of  souls  since  John's  day  the  words 
of  Jesus  have  been  their  most  precious  legacies.  They 
have  studied  them  in  secret  and  through  them  found 
their  way  to  the  heart  of  God.  They  have  taught  them 
by  the  wayside  and  heralded  them  from  the  housetop. 
They  have  carried  them  to  the  uttermost  part  of  the 
earth.  They  have  read  them  on  the  field  of  victory  and 
in  the  lonely  vale  of  sorrow.  They  have  sought  direc- 
tion from  their  counsels  in  the  hour  of  great  perplex- 
ity and  found  substantial  guidance.  They  have  brought 
them  to  the  home  of  bereaved  friends  and  ministered 
sweet  and  abiding  comfort  from  the  sacred  sentences. 
They  have  laid  these  words  under  their  dying  pillow 
and  slept  peacefully  away  the  life  of  care. 

In  the  quiet  chamber  of  the  hospital  attendants 


86  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

found  the  saint  of  God  sitting  in  his  bed,  the  New  Tes- 
tament open  before  him.  His  eyes  would  never  see 
again  the  sacred  page,  nor  the  lips  speak  again  the 
gracious  syllables.  But  these  were  the  words  he  must 
have  read,  ere  he  met  his  Lord : 

"  In  my  Father's  house  are  many  mansions ; 
If  it  were  not  so,  I  would  have  told  you ; 
I  go  to  prepare  a  place  for  you; 
And  if  I  go  and  prepare  a  place  for  you, 
I  will  come  again  and  receive  you  unto  myself; 
That  where  I  am,  there  ye  may  be  also." 


VI 
THE  LAST  RESORT  OP  FAITH 

John  H  :11.    "  Or  else  believe  me  for  (he 
very  icorks'  sake." 

THE  words  have  a  note  of  discouragement  in 
them.  Jesus  had  trained  His  pupils  for  three 
busy  years  in  the  arts  of  faith,  and  now  at  the 
moment  of  their  graduation  found  them  unequal  to  the 
simplest  spiritual  exercise.  Every  teacher  knows  the 
keen  edge  of  disappointment  when  the  promise  of  suc- 
cess bitterly  fails.  The  months  and  years  of  prepara- 
tion we  say  must  surely  bear  fruit.  It  is  incredible 
that  the  dullest  mind  shall  not  somehow  be  infected  by 
the  charm  and  judicious  handling  of  the  expert  In- 
structor. In  spite  of  themselves,  in  spite  of  early  en- 
vironment, of  spiritless  tradition,  and  of  countering 
winds  of  opinion  they  must  believe  Him  on  His  word 
In  school  with  Christ,  at  the  feet  of  the  world's  great 
est  Master,  and  yet  not  bound  to  Him  by  an  infran 
gible  chain  of  Faith !  "  Unthinkable,"  we  exclaim 
with  the  sweep  of  our  full-grown  consciousness ;  "  truly 
they  are  blinded  by  a  bigotry  worse  than  pagan." 

But  wait  a  moment;  Jesus  was  not  in  a  hurry.  He 
knew  that  few  minds  rise  by  a  sudden  swift  ascent  to 
the  summits  of  grace.  The  man  who  lagged  behind 
was  not  for  that  reason  to  be  ignored.  Perhaps,  the 
soul  that  came  slowly,  with  halting  steps,  with  groping 
hand  would  reach  a  loftier  pinnacle  in  the  long  run. 
At  any  rate  He  made  a  place  for  three  kinds  of  spirit- 
ual assent  in  His  kingdom.    You  must  fit  in  with  one  of 

87 


88  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

these,  and  perhaps  in  time  you  may  cover  all  of  them 
successively. 

The  noblest  phase  of  faith  is  that  which  looks  into 
the  heart  of  the  Lord  and  reposes  there.  It  is  shaped 
and  turned  by  an  intuition.  It  is  the  purest,  most  un- 
trammeled  state,  that  the  human  heart  ever  reaches. 
Its  breath  is  the  rare  zephyr  of  an  Alpine  crest.  Its 
light  is  kindled  by  the  rising  sun  of  the  eternal  Mor- 
row. No  discontent  of  earth  sheds  a  dimming  shadow 
over  its  path.  No  neuralgic  gust  of  despondency  chills 
the  warm  peace  that  broods  over  an  accepted  and  ap- 
proved fidelity.  John  on  the  bosom  of  his  Lord  is  a 
singularly  strong  example  of  the  insight  of  Faith. 
John  could  not  construe  the  terms,  but  John  knew  that 
this  present  Jesus  was  in  the  Father  and  the  Father  in 
Him.  On  Patmos,  he  crept  up  the  foothills  of  knowl- 
edge and  got  a  nearer  glimpse, — the  Son  who  had  sat 
down  with  His  Father  on  His  throne.  In  later  days  at 
Ephesus  he  caught  the  consummating  vision, — the 
Word,  that  was  in  the  beginning  with  God,  and  was 
God!  Many  like  John  and  since  his  day  have  bathed 
their  hearts  in  the  glow  of  such  faith.  Multitudes  to- 
day are  girding  themselves  for  the  arduous  ascent. 
You  may  join  them.  The  sharp  Matterhorn  of  faith 
points  its  sun-kissed  head  to  the  skies  and  invites  you 
to  come. 

A  lower  register  is  sounded  in  the  acceptance  of 
truth.  Truth,  you  know,  meets  the  mind  in  the  form 
of  a  statement.  It  carries  its  own  validity  with  it.  It 
cannot  be  anything  but  what  it  is.  You  would  not 
stop  to  demonstrate  a  truth,  for  you  regard  its  terms 
as  final.  When  I  say  that  two  and  two  make  four  I 
should  shrug  my  shoulders  with  impatience  at  a  man 
who  asked  me,  Why?     What  else  can  they  make? 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  89 

Did  you  ever  find  an  instance  when  they  added  up  to 
five?  Could  you  conceive  of  any  combination  of  cir- 
cumstances where  they  would  make  anything  but  four? 
This  sum  is  not  affected  by  temperature  nor  by  the 
rotation  of  the  earth  on  its  axis  nor  by  the  curvature 
of  the  surface  of  the  earth.  This  sum  is  not  affected 
by  the  bodily  ills  of  the  man  who  makes  it  nor  by  any 
mental  derangement.  Its  truth  is  fixed.  Science,  too, 
has  some  truths  or  facts  that  are  not  axioms  and  yet 
commend  themselves  to  the  mind  as  sure.  For  example, 
the  heliocentric  theory  of  our  system  is  to  us  abso- 
lutely sure.  Who  would  stand  now  with  old  Ptolemy 
of  Egypt  and  argue  for  the  central  position  of  the 
earth?  The  theory  proves  itself,  so  lucent  and  con- 
vincing are  its  factors.  That  is  the  basic  idea  of 
Truth.  I  am  not  conscious  of  a  gap  in  thought  when 
I  apply  the  same  definition  of  truth  to  religion.  The 
word  was  not  unfamiliar  to  Jesus.  Indeed,  if  we  fol- 
low John's  record  we  meet  it  virtually  in  every 
chapter.  Truth  was  atmospheric  with  the  Speaker  of 
these  last  discourses.  He  lived  it.  He  breathed  it,  He 
exhaled  it  fr^om  His  person.  Truth,  then,  was  the  cer- 
tain deposit  of  revelation  to  His  church. 

But  truth  can  come  to  the  mind  only  in  the  form  of 
a  statement  about  something.  The  first  attitude  of  the 
mind  is  critical.  You  must  learn  what  this  thing  is 
that  goes  by  the  name  of  truth.  You  must  study  the 
means  of  its  transmission,  ask  how  God  could  move 
so  powerfully  on  human  hearts  as  to  secrete  His 
truth  there,  and  then  move  on  them  again  so  mightily 
that  they  could  utter  His  truth  in  current  speech. 
You  must  further  take  apart  the  several  elements  of 
truth ;  unfold  the  essence  of  the  moral  law ;  pursue  the 
development  of  the  chosen  people;  bend  your  ear  to 


90  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  indictment  of  sin  by  prophetic  indignation;  scru- 
tinize the  austere  face  of  the  Ascetic  who  preaches 
and  baptizes  by  the  Jordan;  turn  with  him  to  the 
new  Prophet,  hear,  see,  converse  with  Jesus  for  a  term 
of  years ;  stand  before  the  blood-swathed  cross,  at  the 
broken  tomb,  on  Olivet's  brow  as  He  ascends ;  and  then 
live  in  the  empowered  church  for  two  generations, 
till  the  last  word  of  inspiration  is  written; — you  must 
do  all  this,  ere  you  will  be  ready  to  weigh  the  syllables 
of  truth  and  give  an  intellectual  judgment. 

But  that  is  not  the  end.  Truth,  as  here  detailed,  has 
a  sting  to  it.  It  is  not  like  the  truth  of  science, — 
accept  it  or  not  as  you  please,  since  belief  does  not 
change  conditions  of  life.  The  future  is  wrapped  up 
for  you  in  this  judgment.  Ideals  of  character  hang 
on  your  decision.  To  believe  is  to  get  a  lien  on  heaven ; 
to  reject  is  to  tie  your  interests  to  earth.  It  is  ex- 
tremely necessary  that  we  form  correct  views  of 
Christ.  I  do  not  speak  of  elaborate  creeds,  woven  by 
the  arts  of  logic  and  rhetoric  expression.  These  have 
served  a  useful  purpose  in  the  world.  What  we  need 
is  not  truth  on  paper  but  truth  burned  into  the  heart. 
"  Ye  shall  know  the  truth,"  exclaimed  the  Teacher,  the 
truth  He  taught,  the  truth  about  Him,  the  truth  that 
never  could  be  rescinded  or  extinguished.  This  is  the 
next  level  of  faith;  and  while  it  does  not  rise  to  the 
height  of  the  former  it  plants  a  firm  stepping-stone  up 
to  union  with  the  Lord.  If  the  disciples  had  only 
seized  the  truth,  they  would  have  been  saved  the 
wretched  hours  of  despair  after  the  tomb  shut  the 
precious  remains  out  of  their  sight. 

The  lowest  form  of  Faith  next  awaits  our  attention, 
and  this  we  study  at  some  length.  I,  for  one,  wish  the 
Saviour  had  not  been  forced  to  admit  it  into  His  classi- 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  91 

fication.  But  it  is  there,  just  because  it  is  here. 
Jesus  does  not  deal  with  humankind  in  an  idealized 
state.  He  takes  us  as  we  are.  He  does  not  apply  some 
cut-and-dried  method;  He  adapts  the  method  to  the 
soul.  You  might  have  thought  that  Thomas  would 
respond  with  unwineing  faith  to  the  representation  of 
his  comrades,  "  We  have  seen  the  Lord."  But  no ! 
Human  nature  reigns  and  particularly  Thomas'  brand 
of  human  nature.  Believe  on  such  a  shadowy  basis 
the  abnormal  fact  of  a  resurrection?  Never!  He  de- 
mands a  better  proof  than  the  possibly  mistaken  per- 
ception of  his  friends.  He  asks  for  the  "  works,"  the 
very  condition  that  Jesus  had  forestalled  in  this  lowest 
form  of  faith.  He  gets  his  demand.  Jesus  did  not 
chide  him ;  Jesus  did  not  taunt  him  with  disloyalty  or 
suspicious  distrust.  He  only  invited  him  to  do  the 
thing  he  himself  had  required.  But  when  the  disciple 
was  satisfied,  then  He  uttered  that  glorious  beatitude 
on  all  in  succeeding  ages  who  without  the  sight  of  His 
pierced  hands  and  spear-thrust  side,  with  no  human 
vision  of  their  King,  should  yet  in  exultant  faith  hail 
Him  as  their  Lord  and  their  unmodified  God ! 

The  Last  Resort  of  Faith  is  the  theme  of  the  text, 
and  I  invite  you  to  resolve  it  into  its  three  elements. 


First,  this  kind  of  faith  is  the  rule  of  the  market, — 
we  must  see  or  we  decline  to  believe.  I  am  persuaded 
that  the  works  cited  by  Jesus  were  His  public  miracles. 
The  word  used  in  the  passage  had  grown  into  a  tech- 
nical term  conveying  a  definite  meaning  to  the  hearer. 
When  Jesus  said  "  works  "  they  did  not  think  of  phil- 
anthropic works,  e.  g.,  buying  bread  in  the  shop  and 


92  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

carrying  it  to  the  hungry.  They  recalled  the  moun- 
tainside, the  assembled  thousands,  the  westering  sun, 
the  question  to  Philip,  the  five  loaves,  and  two  fishes — 
the  seated  throng,  the  broken  bread,  the  lavish  distri- 
bution after  giving  thanks,  and  the  baskets  that  re- 
mained. It  was  a  miracle  stupendous  in  amount,  in- 
credible in  origin.  It  satisfied  their  faith  as  well 
as  their  appetite.  Now  they  knew  that  this  was  the 
"  teacher  come  from  God,  for  no  man  could  do  these 
signs  except  God  were  with  him,"  The  works  of  Jesus 
again  could  not  be  simply  ceremonial  acts  in  the 
temple  or  on  the  rostrum  of  the  synagogue.  They  did 
remember  that  He  went  into  the  place  of  meeting  by 
regular  habit;  they  knew  that  He  attended  the  sacred 
feasts  at  Jerusalem  as  every  pious  Israelite  must.  But 
it  was  not  these  facts  that  lay  paramount  in  their 
mind.  It  was  the  fact  that  near  the  one  place  He 
gave  sight  to  the  blind,  and  in  the  other  He  strength- 
ened the  withered  arm.  Undoubtedly  the  works  of 
Jesus  startled  and  fixed  the  attention  of  the  people. 
The  exclamations  recorded  in  the  Gospels  show  us 
how  deeply  impressed  beholders  were.  "  We  never 
saw  it  of  this  fashion,"  was  the  verdict  after  the  cure 
of  the  paralytic.  "We  have  seen  strange  things,  to- 
day." Truly  the  things  were  new  and  passing  strange. 
But  they  were  just  the  events  that  human  fancy 
craved ;  and,  we  may  as  well  admit,  they  were  the  only 
things  that  at  that  time  and  perhaps  in  other  times, 
too,  could  arrest  the  eye  and  shock  the  mind  into 
reverent  regard. 

We  are  as  a  race  devoted  to  the  idea  of  external  and 
objective  reality.  We  seek  for  things  that  can  be 
measured  by  the  five  senses.  We  are  incurably  dra- 
matic.   All  the  world's  a  stage,  and  we  are  actors  on 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  93 

it.  That  is,  we  are  never  content  with  the  subtle 
processes  of  the  soul.  There  is  something  decidedly 
Grecian  in  our  system.  We  must  have  a  troop  of 
deities  playing  in  the  forest,  by  the  stream,  and  visu- 
alized in  the  city  street  or  the  noble  temple.  We  are 
like  the  early  Japanese ;  we  frame  our  earth  and  people 
our  lands  by  the  direct  interposition  of  the  fancied 
Powers.  Men  today  call  themselves  scientific  and 
practical;  men  ask  for  open  results,  tabulated  statis- 
tics, concrete  forms.  It  is  the  store  full  of  goods  and 
the  ledger  full  of  sales;  it  is  the  seething  furnace  and 
roaring  machinery;  it  is  the  rushing  train  loaded  to 
the  top  with  freight  or  carrying  the  precious  burden 
of  human  lives;  it  is  the  massive  battleship,  every 
fourteen-inch  gun  primed  for  use;  it  is  the  govern- 
ment service,  with  power  oozing  out  of  every  depart- 
ment; it  is  the  uncovered  mine  with  its  inexhaustible 
veins  of  gold;  it  is  the  nerve  and  fiber  of  body  and 
brain  in  a  wild  quest  of  perishable  goods, — it  is  these 
that  men  speak  of  as  worthy  of  belief;  and  it  is  these 
to  which  the  unstinted  energy  of  mind  and  muscle  is 
given.    We  are  believers  in  the  Real. 

We  believe  in  the  Real,  too,  as  respects  science. 
The  mere  theory  of  nature  has  no  interest  for  us. 
What  difference  does  it  make  to  me  whether  the  earth 
is  hot  or  cold  at  its  center  so  long  as  I  am  not  melted 
or  reduced  to  frozen  torpor?  If  the  majestic  comet 
sweeps  round  us  with  its  skirt  of  flame,  why  should  we 
be  exercised  as  to  its  orbit  or  its  age,  providing  it  does 
not  smite  us  in  its  hilarious  course?  We  are  looking 
for  things  definite  and  useful.  The  reason  why  the 
common  people  were  not  interested  in  the  doctrine  of 
evolution  was  just  this ;  there  was  altogether  too  much 
hypothesis  in  it.    You  had  to  make  an  hypothesis  to 


94i  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

get  a  rock  into  a  vegetable,  and  another  hypothesis  to 
change  the  plant  into  the  rudimentary  amoeba,  and, 
finally,  a  very  broad  and  daring  hypothesis  to  cover 
the  chasm  between  animal  and  man,  a  chasm  running 
down  deep  into  the  division  between  nervous  sentiency 
and  moral  judgment.  If  you  could  only  show  them  the 
process,  just  change  the  one  into  the  other,  then  by 
virtue  of  the  demonstration  they  would  believe.  What 
a  strange  race  we  are,  with  confident  scientists  on  one 
side,  and  a  mocking,  unbelieving  mass  of  humanity  on 
the  other! 

It  is  to  this  innate  feeling  that  Jesus  makes  a  con- 
cession. Spiritual  minds  need  no  sign;  they  leap  joy- 
ously over  the  unbridged  chasm  between  faith  and 
knowledge  and  stand  unalarmed  on  the  tableland  of 
grace.  But  the  common  soul  cannot  do  it.  And  Jesus 
loved  the  "  slow  of  heart."  He  was  a  genuine  teacher ; 
He  would  rather  deal  with  the  smouldering  fire  then 
cast  ready  fuel  into  the  raging  flames.  The  divine 
Father  has  ever  trained  the  dull  instincts  of  the  race 
in  this  way.  He  has  not  left  Himself  without  some 
witness  in  nature  or  conscience.  That  witness  has  in 
untutored  nations  incited  minds  to  see  the  divine  in 
the  objects  of  sense,  the  blazing  and  friendly  sun,  the 
beating  and  destructive  tempest,  the  silent  grave  and 
the  shades  of  departed  spirits.  That  witness  has 
started  up  deeds  of  expiation,  has  prompted  costly 
sacrifices  even  to  the  life  of  a  beloved  child.  Much  of 
this  has  been  dreadfully  mistaken.  And  much  has  been 
the  sodden  interpretation  of  a  selfish  nature.  But  at 
any  rate  it  proves  that  the  mind  must  have  its  out- 
ward symbols,  if  only  the  crude  fetich  its  own  hands 
have  fashioned.  We  need  the  Real  and  we  accept  its 
token. 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  95 

The  miracle  served  in  Jesus'  day  to  satisfy  the  un- 
spiritualized  demand  for  a  visible  object.  We  do  not 
ask  for  such  signs  now.  Certainly  the  church  has  gone 
by  the  point  of  credulity  when  a  supposed  miracle  can 
create  faith.  We  laugh  in  the  face  of  an  ignorant 
priest  who  assures  the  lame  man  that  he  may  throw 
away  his  crutches  by  being  sprinkled  with  holy  water, 
bowing  before  a  consecrated  picture,  or  rubbing  the 
surface  of  the  crucifix  that  has  been  "  blessed."  We 
shake  the  finger  of  scorn  at  any  code  of  religious  sci- 
ence that  presumes  by  the  aid  of  an  expert  "  reader  " 
to  root  out  the  seeds  of  some  organic  disease.  That 
may  be  the  last  resort  of  physiologic  faith ;  but  is  not 
the  last  resort  of  an  honest  heart  which  seeks  com- 
munion with  God.  These  are  testimonies  to  men's  in- 
satiable trust  to  their  senses.  "  Let  me  see  the  effect 
of  divine  power,"  is  the  cry  of  a  myriad  broken  hearts, 
which  become  the  prey  and  victims  of  designing  im- 
posters  and  are  perhaps  led  down  the  broad  road  to 
religious  despair. 

But  we  need  not  throw  away  absolutely  the  craving 
for  an  objective  and  real  exhibit.  God  grants  in  our 
day  miracles  not  in  the  world  of  matter  but  in  the 
serener  and  more  plastic  world  of  spirit.  We  may  call 
them  "works,"  divine  deeds,  wrought  by  the  brooding 
power  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Wherever  a  craven  soul  has 
taken  new  courage,  wherever  a  blistered  heart  has  been 
fired  by  new  zeal,  wherever  a  drunken  brute  has  risen 
from  his  place  in  the  gutter  and  taken  his  seat  by  the 
Table  of  the  Lord,  there  you  have  a  wondrous  Work 
which  every  eye  can  see  and  every  soul  can  repeat  in 
its  own  experience.  Such  works  were  done  by  Christ 
in  His  earthly  ministry,  as  when  He  turned  the  tide 
of  Zaccheus'  life  and  gave  him  a  goal  for  faith.    But, 


96  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

perhaps,  they  were  so  emphatically  eclipsed  by  the 
physical  miracles  that  men  did  not  stop  to  wonder 
at  their  grandeur.  We  wonder  at  them  now.  We  be- 
hold the  savage  of  New  Hebrides  changed  and  in  his 
right  mind.  It  is  a  manifest  "  work  "  of  God.  It  is  a 
strong  argument  for  the  truth  of  Christianity.  It  sat- 
isfies the  terms  of  a  market  contract, — ^you  can  see, 
you  can  hear,  you  can  touch.  If  any  man  stands  in 
doubt  as  to  the  efiScacy  of  grace  he  may  look  to  the 
black  faces  on  the  Bouth  Sea  Islands  smiling  with  a 
joy  that  the  miser  does  not  know,  and  get  a  fair  guar- 
anty of  the  power  of  God  to  save. 

II 

We  pass  to  the  second  element  in  the  "  works  "  ; — 
it  declares  something  extraordinary.  The  miracle  could 
not  be  explained  by  any  of  the  laws  then  known  to  the 
world.  And  for  the  matter  of  that  all  the  scientific  in- 
quiry of  the  past  three  hundred  years  has  not  satis- 
factorily covered  the  case.  It  was  clear  that  Christ 
did  not  perform  them  by  any  tricks  of  legerdemain, 
though  the  Pharisees  said  He  was  in  league  with  Be- 
elzebub, that  is,  the  occult  and  demonic  powers  of 
nature.  It  was  clear,  too,  that  mere  physical  mag- 
netism could  not  account  for  the  diversity  of  cures  and 
certainly  could  not  be  a  cause  for  the  unusual  effects 
on  material  nature.  It  would  be  clear  in  present  day 
discussions  that  mental  healing,  the  hypnotic  influence 
of  a  great  religious  idea,  could  not  create  sight  where 
it  had  never  existed.  Congenital  blindness  is  a  diflS- 
cult  problem  for  unaided  psychology.  The  miracles  of 
Christ  could  not  have  been  produced  by  functions 
already  at  work  in  the  world.  If  not,  then  some  other 
force  must  have  been  introduced.     But  how  did  it 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  97 

come?  It  could  only  come  by  breaking  in  on  the 
laws  which  have  always  sustained  the  weight  of  the 
world;  or  by  so  guiding  the  functions  of  nature  by  a 
Superior  Hand  that  they  will  do  work  they  have 
never  hitherto  done.  David  Hume  said,  a  Miracle 
broke  the  thread  of  uniformity,  was  an  interloper  in 
the  universe,  and  could  not  be  admitted.  Jesus  said. 
My  Father  worketh  up  to  this  time,  and  I  work.  Which 
of  these  explanations  will  you  accept?  If  God  created 
the  world,  whether  by  an  instantaneous  act  or  by  the 
long  progress  of  evolution,  then  He  may  be  said  to  have 
the  right  and  the  power  to  work  in  it  at  His  pleasure. 
If  He  does  work  His  power  will  be  purely  spiritual; 
and  as  such  it  cannot  and  will  not  interfere  with  laws 
which  He  has  previously  set  in  motion. 

The  point  I  make  here  is  that  the  extraordinary 
works  which  followed  the  steps  of  Jesus  have  a  divine 
source  and  may  justly  challenge  the  admiration  of  the 
world.  I  do  not  say  that  signs  were  given  to  gratify 
the  thoughtless  curiosity  of  the  age.  Again  and  again 
the  Lord  refused  point-blank  to  be  party  to  so  friv- 
olous and  irreverent  a  use  of  His  power.  "  An  evil  and 
adulterous  generation  seeketh  after  a  sign;  but  there 
shall  no  sign  be  given  it,  but  the  sign  of  the  prophet 
Jonah," — truly  a  sign  of  sufficient  magnitude  to  clinch 
the  faith  of  an  entire  people.  Christ  does  not  work  for 
histrionic  effect.  It  would  have  done  no  good  to 
heal  a  leper  in  the  presence  of  King  Herod  who  be- 
lieved like  all  pagans  in  the  activity  of  the  underworld. 
He  wanted  to  see  a  miracle,  that  he  might  gape  at  it 
as  he  did  at  a  conjurer's  trick.  But  he  knew  that  a 
trick  could  be  explained,  and  he  would  set  down  Jesus' 
works  to  connivance  with  the  devils.  On  the  other 
hand,  earnest  souls  needing  a  nearer  view  of  God 


98  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

might  be  forced  by  some  wonderful  event  to  feel  the 
presence  of  the  Deity  and  yield  their  assent  to  His 
word. 

Most  of  us  know  what  it  is  to  stand  before  a  mys- 
tery. All  the  great  discoveries  of  science  were  at  one 
time  mysterious  portents.  To  the  Polynesian  savage 
the  trickling  of  water  into  a  newly-dug  well  is  a 
miraculous  event.  In  ancient  times  the  cure  for  some 
bodily  ills  by  bathing  in  a  mineral  spring  seemed  re- 
markable to  the  point  of  mystery.  All  the  world  knows 
how  slowly  the  spell  of  wonder  at  the  developments  in 
electrical  science  wears  away;  for  just  when  we  are 
growing  accustomed  to  the  new  regime  along  comes 
some  more  amazing  discovery  to  rekindle  the  old  fer- 
vor. And  yet  we  stand  today  before  the  age-long 
mysteries  that  have  never  been  resolved, — how  life  is 
sustained  in  the  creations  of  nature,  how  mind  and 
matter  coalesce  in  the  human  personality,  how  man 
looks  up  instinctively  to  find  his  Lord  in  the  heavens. 
Religion  is  said  to  begin  in  wonder  and  perhaps  it 
does.  And  certainly  for  us  as  Christians  it  may  right- 
fully end  there.  For  who  may  stop  marveling  at  the 
goodness  of  God  that  spent  His  Son's  life  on  earth  for 
the  reclamation  of  men,  steeped  in  sin  and  not 
ashamed  of  it?  And  who  may  contain  his  admiration 
when  divine  Grace  awakes  the  slumbering  soul  of  a 
worldling,  convicts  it  of  deadly  indifference,  reveals  the 
splendors  of  piety, — only  an  obnoxious  dream  before, 
— and  calls  it  to  sacrifice  of  wealth,  time,  and  love  for 
the  Lord  Christ  and  His  perishing  children? 

You  tell  me,  this  is  very  different  from  gazing  on 
miracles  of  power.  The  field  is  different;  even  the 
kind  of  emotion  excited  is  not  the  same.  Perhaps,  you 
are  right,  and  I  think  you  are.    There  is  a  difference, 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH  99 

a  profound  difference.  But  the  superiority  is  all  on 
the  side  of  the  moral  miracle.  I  consider  that  when 
Christ  slew  the  old  Saul  by  the  zenith-light  He  wrought 
a  mightier  miracle  than  when  He  healed  the  blind  man. 
I  hold  that  when  on  Pentecost's  day  He  pierced  the 
heart  of  the  craven  Peter  and  girded  him  to  one  of 
the  most  crucial  endeavors  in  human  history  He  did  a 
far  greater  work,  than  when  on  the  mountainside  He 
cast  the  demon  from  the  wallowing  boy.  In  the  one 
case  He  smote  a  blow  on  one  of  the  desperate  mental 
troubles  of  that  day;  in  the  other,  He  expelled  the 
demon,  fear. 

You  tell  me  again  that  we  should  not  compare  the 
wonder  in  religion  and  the  astonishment  at  natural 
events.  True  enough,  they  do  not  agree.  When  you  get 
wise  and  learned  you  will  understand  the  latter.  But 
study  as  you  may,  believe  as  abundantly  as  you  will, 
you  cannot  grasp  the  limitless  power  of  God.  Not 
through  all  eternity  will  you  be  able  to  measure  the 
forgiving  love  which  gave  us  that  supremest  miracle  of 
all,  the  Person  of  the  Incarnate  Son.  The  moral  energy 
that  springs  from  the  Cross  of  Jesus  flows  through 
the  channels  of  men's  lives.  You  may  see  it,  you  may 
fmarvel  at  its  sweep,  you  may  even  be  abashed  before 
the  eye  of  one  who  rose  from  the  dregs  to  the  throne 
of  human  character.  It  is  the  modern  challenge  to 
every  skeptical  mind;  it  is  the  divine  invitation  and 
the  divine  promise  to  you.  If  wonder  be  the  source  of 
religion,  this  most  stupendous  of  all  wonders  may  lead 
you  into  the  kingdom. 

Ill 

We  reach  the  most  important  element  in  miracle, 
viz.,  its  purpose.    Why  did  Jesus  perform  the  works 


100  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

to  which  He  now  directs  the  disciples'  halting  faith? 
He  certainly  did  not  exhibit  this  power  for  His  own 
gratification;  as  a  juggler  might  try  to  see  how  long 
he  could  keep  four  balls  in  the  air  without  missing  a 
cast.  He  was  not  drawn  on  unwittingly  by  the  spirit 
of  His  age  to  develop  His  occult  power  in  a  variety  of 
forms.  Such  was  the  opinion  of  Ernest  Renan.  He 
did  not  make  a  dramatic,  a  theatrical  display  of  super- 
natural gifts,  in  order  to  hearten  His  disciples  for 
their  first  campaign.  After  they  were  dead  the  life 
of  the  church  and  the  faith  of  the  individual  Chris- 
tian would  have  no  relation  to  these  ancient  wonders. 
The  judgment  of  a  certain  school  of  current  thought 
is  satisfied  with  this  hollow  theory  of  the  miraculous. 
Nor  can  we  exclude  them  altogether  from  the  body  of 
truth  as  being  woven  there  by  the  automatic  fancy  of 
early  believers.  There  is  a  valid  purpose  in  every 
act  even  as  there  is  a  great  principle  in  every  parable. 
If  you  say,  the  miracle  is  an  acted  parable  you  have  got 
as  near  to  the  heart  of  the  matter  as  an  epigram  can 
ever  lead  you. 

The  miracles  of  our  Saviour  had  two  poles,  one 
resting  in  Himself,  the  other  in  His  attendants.  The 
positive  pole  took  into  account  who  He  was.  It  was 
determined  by  His  divine  origin.  That  divinity  did 
not  belong  to  His  body,  for  His  body  was  quite  like 
every  other  man's.  It  must  therefore  belong  to  His 
spirit.  Now  spirit  has,  as  we  all  know,  a  powerful 
influence  on  the  body.  Thus,  when  fear  strikes  the 
mind  the  body  feels  itself  on  the  verge  of  collapse; 
and  when  anger  flashes  from  the  soul  the  face  grows 
white,  the  lips  tremble,  and  the  very  form  is  shaken 
with  the  intensity  of  emotion.  If  Jesus'  divine  power 
is  seated  in  His  spirit  it  will  utter  itself,  not  only  by 


THE  LAST  RESORT  OF  FAITH         101 

word  but  by  the  magnetism  of  the  nerve.  Hence,  we 
find  healing  issuing  from  the  spoken  command  and 
from  the  silent  emanations  of  His  person.  Moreover,  if 
God  is  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world  to  Himself 
what  hinders  His  being  in  the  same  Lord  aflSrming  His 
eternal  authority  over  matter?  But  since  Christ  is 
God  manifest  in  the  flesh  the  miracle  is  no  mediated 
effect  but  the  original  output  of  power.  That  is  one 
pole  of  the  wonder,  to  show  divinity. 

The  other  pole  rests  in  the  minds  of  the  witnesses. 
They  had  to  receive  the  new  truth,  or  how  could  they 
ever  enter  the  kingdom?  The  miracle  was  designed 
to  put  men  in  possession  of  divine  revelation.  Its 
aim  was  not  to  prove  the  deity  of  Jesus  and  the 
authority  of  His  words,  but  to  help  them  understand 
what  His  truth  was.  In  other  words,  as  Dr.  Bruce  says, 
miracle  was  the  vehicle  of  revelation.  It  is  bound  up 
with  the  other  forms  of  truth.  It  is  woven  into  the 
warp  and  woof  of  the  sacred  text.  To  eliminate  one 
is  to  eliminate  all.  The  feeding  of  the  five  thousand 
is  not  simply  the  peg  on  which  the  illuminating  dis- 
course of  the  Bread  of  Life  is  hung.  It  has  a  distinct 
and  evident  declaration  of  its  own.  It  holds  the  Per- 
son of  Christ  before  the  world  as  equal  with  God  in 
the  creation  and  disposition  of  matter.  You  are  not 
only  entranced  with  the  sublimity  of  the  truth  He 
teaches;  you  are  caught,  amazed,  awed  by  this  Figure, 
greater  than  Moses,  which  rises  above  the  ideas  of 
earthly  power  and  takes  its  seat  by  the  right  hand  of 
God.  Would  you  discard  the  miracle  and  save  the 
sermon?  Would  you  venture  to  abolish  the  Sacra- 
ment and  support  only  the  truth  that  lies  at  its  base? 
No,  we  must  have  the  Teacher  but  we  must  have  the 
Worker  as  well.    If  you  cannot  lift  your  heavy  souls 


102  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

to  the  height  of  faith  in  His  eternal  principles,  you 
can  at  least  open  your  blinking  eyes  to  the  shimmer- 
ing light  by  Galilee's  Lake.  If  you  cannot  take  in  the 
reason  for  the  resurrection  or  accept  the  testimony 
of  His  friends,  you  can  at  least  stand  with  bowed 
head  at  the  mouth  of  the  ruptured  tomb  and  cry  with 
passionate  voice  into  its  deeps,  "  If  thou  hast  taken 
Him  away,  show  me  where  thou  hast  laid  Him !  "  And 
then,  oh,  then,  perchance,  you  will  hear  behind  you 
the  sweetest  tones  that  ever  mortal  ear  heard,  and 
turning  you  will  see  the  fairest  Form  that  ever  mor- 
tal eyes  beheld,  and  like  the  yearning  Magdalen  you 
may  fall  at  His  feet  and  breathe  out  the  precious 
words,  "  Rabboni !  " — Master !  So  much  for  the  phys- 
ical wonder. 

I  need  not  ask  what  you  take  to  be  the  purpose  of 
the  moral  miracle.  Erroneous  notions  have  crept  into 
the  church's  doctrine  on  this  subject.  God  does  not 
save  men  solely  to  present  an  effective  instance  of  His 
sovereign  pleasure.  Nor  does  He  save  them,  because 
there  was  no  other  way  out  of  a  creative  diflSculty. 
God  saves  men,  because  He  loves  them.  God  sent  His 
Son  as  the  most  glorious  emblem  of  His  love.  You 
may  be  a  miracle,  if  you  let  the  blood  of  Christ  be 
sprinkled  on  your  heart.  You  may  repeat  the  won- 
drous work  done  on  the  soul  of  Augustine.  You  may 
be  not  a  mere  witness  of  the  event;  you  may  be  its 
insulated  subject.  "  The  grace  of  God  that  bringeth 
salvation  hath  appeared  to  all  men  "  ;  it  now  appears 
to  you.  Hold  up  the  hand  of  faith,  ray  friend,  and  let 
the  electric  current  of  truth  enter  your  soul. 


VII 
THE  SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD 


John  14  -'12.  "  And  greater  works  than 
these  shall  he  do,  because  I  go  unto  the 
Father." 


THE  words  of  our  Lord  in  this  verse  institute 
both  a  comparison  and  a  challenge.  The  com- 
parison is  between  Himself  and  His  successors, 
and  we  are  doubtless  surprised  to  read  its  terms.  The 
challenge  is  addressed  to  men  of  halting  spirit,  feeble, 
resourceless,  and  on  the  brink  of  despair.  They  could 
not  descry  the  future;  they  could  only  detect  the  low- 
ering shades  of  night  within  whose  sable  pall  they 
were  already  beginning  to  be  wrapped.  The  challenge, 
however,  had  its  glint  of  hope  in  the  unexpected  com- 
parison. It  does  not  matter  how  they  had  hitherto 
thought  of  Jesus.  Their  penetration  into  His  mind 
may  have  been  exceedingly  slight,  their  faith  in  His 
predestined  Messiahship  infinitely  small.  One  thing 
had  become  plain  to  them,  namely,  that  they  could 
never  rise  to  the  height  of  goodness  attained  by  Him. 
It  would  seem,  then,  to  be  folly  to  speak  of  the 
servant's  surpassing  his  Lord.  Yet  Jesus'  language 
admits  of  no  other  construction.  Why  should  one  at- 
tempt to  reinterpret  the  comparison  in  view  of  the 
glowing  centers  of  light  that  mark  the  onward  sweep 
of  his  church,  like  Eastern  stars  luring  Wise  men  to 
their  goal?  That  the  Saviour's  work  has  already  been 
excelled  stands  proven  on  the  page  of  history.    It  is 

103 


104  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

our  duty  now  to  accept  the  challenge  and  study  its 
conditions. 


First,  we  are  constrained  to  ask  where  the  supe- 
riority of  the  believer  lies.  The  answer  is,  In  the  works. 
The  superiority  could  not  lie  in  intellectual  ability. 
Jesus  evinced  a  depth  of  understanding,  a  reasoning 
faculty,  a  charm  of  manner,  and  skill  in  argument, 
that  compelled  attention  from  His  bitterest  enemies. 
They  sent  their  best  debaters  to  catch  Him  in  His 
speech  but  He  defeated  them  with  their  own  logic. 
They  dispatched  officers  of  state  to  arrest  Him  with- 
out notice  but  His  words  exercised  so  subtle  a  fasci- 
nation over  their  practical  minds  that  they  came  away 
exclaiming,  Never  man  spake  like  this  man.  Jesus  was 
Grecian  in  the  composition  of  His  mind;  could  the 
disciples  ever  hope  even  to  equal  Him,  let  alone 
surpass  His  powers?  Many  a  teacher  has  trained 
students  who  developed  far  larger  capacity  than  he. 
I  remember  one  who  frankly  stated  that  he  expected 
his  pupils  to  outstrip  him  in  service;  that  was  his 
business  as  a  teacher.  Certainly,  the  men  who  guided 
the  unfolding  mind  of  John  Calvin,  some  of  them 
the  strongest  intellects  of  their  age,  must  have  seen 
the  brilliant  genius  that  lay  plastic  beneath  their 
touch  and  have  forestalled  the  verdict  of  time.  I  am 
aware  that  critics  have  argued  for  an  advance  of 
doctrine  as  between  Paul  and  Christ.  And  some  have 
gone  to  the  length  of  holding  that  the  Apostle  created 
certain  cardinal  dogmas  that  lay  beyond  the  reach  of 
Jesus'  mind.  The  point  is  not  well  taken  and  cannot 
be  sustained.  The  central  theme  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment is  redemption,  atonement  by  the  blood  of  the 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      105 

Cross.  Did  Paul  conceive  it?  Was  it  his  masterly 
interpretation  of  the  Gross  that  first  laid  before  the 
infant  church  the  possibility  of  salvation  by  the  death 
of  Jesus?  If  that  be  true  then  he  stands  as  the 
foremost  thinker  in  all  the  realm  of  human  exertion. 
The  real  fact  is  that  while  he  gloriously  developed  the 
truth  the  Lord  Himself  had  planted  the  primal  seed, 
that  protoplasmic  power  which  has  vitalized  a  stricken 
world. 

Again,  the  superiority  did  not  lie  in  character. 
Many  a  teacher  whose  pupils  have  excelled  him  in 
achievement  has  had  a  heart  of  gold;  indeed,  his  own 
spirit  has  shaped  the  contour  of  their  lives.  I  have 
been  reading  once  more  of  Luther,  the  gigantic  mover  of 
the  Reformation.  His  will  was  indomitable,  his  per- 
sonal prowess  unrestrained.  He  stirred,  gripped, 
moulded,  stimulated  Germany  as  no  other  man  ever 
influenced  his  native  land.  In  the  blaze  of  his  per- 
ennial popularity  we  are  apt  to  forget  the  forces  that 
guided  him.  Follow  him  into  the  recesses  of  his  early 
studies,  his  mental  struggles,  and  his  final  triumphs, 
and  there  you  find  at  least  one  man  whose  words  helped 
Luther  to  the  truth.  Staupitz  had  little  of  the  dra- 
matic to  commend  him  to  the  admiration  of  the 
masses;  but  he  had  a  heart  of  warm,  pulsing,  evangelic 
blood,  and  Luther  once  feeling  it  never  afterwards 
forgot  its  beat.  It  is  frequently  the  quiet  preceptor 
in  a  quiet  study  who  gives  to  the  world  in  a  person 
other  than  his  own  a  power  that  makes  for  good. 
Luther  did  not  excel  the  patient  monk  of  Erfurt  in 
piety.  Can  we  for  a  moment  presume  that  the  dis- 
ciples would  dim  the  sinless  fame  of  Jesus  by  a'  spirit- 
ual glory  of  their  own? 

Well,  if  the  servant  has  no  advantage  over  his  Lord 


106  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

either  in  mind  or  heart,  where,  we  ask,  can  the  supe- 
riority lie?  It  must  have  some  basis  if  the  assertion 
of  the  text  be  right.  Let  us  keep  strictly  to  the  words 
and  we  shall  have  no  trouble.  Jesus  makes  no  com- 
parison as  to  talents  but  only  as  to  works.  It  would 
be  false  modesty  for  Him  to  belittle  His  mental  or 
moral  stature.  He  was  not  afraid  to  say,  "  Which  of 
you  convicteth  me  of  sin?"  But  He  knew  that  His 
own  accomplishments  were  merely  premonitions  of  the 
greater  deeds  to  be  wrought  by  a  consecrated  church. 
Therefore  the  verse  reads :  "  And  greater  works  than 
these  shall  he  do." 

What  were  the  works  Jesus  had  in  view?  There 
are  only  two  kinds  possible,  those  impinging  on  matter 
and  those  that  take  place  in  the  realm  of  spirit.  To 
which  of  these  did  He  refer?  The  answers  have  been 
various  but  I  think  we  can  arrive  at  the  truth. 

Let  us  examine  His  works  on  nature  and  ask,  if  these 
can  be  excelled.  You  must  always  judge  of  a  physical 
fact  from  two  standpoints,  as  to  what  it  is,  and  as  to 
how  it  impresses  the  observer.  We  are  persuaded  that 
our  Lord  displayed  marvelous  power  over  the  forces 
of  the  natural  world.  He  healed  the  sick,  He  erased 
the  leprous  spots,  He  illuminated  the  blind  eyes,  He 
traced  a  path  on  the  trackless  deep,  He  fed  the  hungry 
multitude  from  a  minimum  store,  and  He  gave  back  to 
the  body  the  escaped  spark  of  life.  What  more  was 
there  to  do?  Looking  at  the  career  of  the  apostles,  we 
ask,  Did  they  produce  works  different  in  type  from 
these?  A  close  inspection  reveals  the  utmost  sim- 
ilarity. Looking  at  the  career  of  the  church  we  note 
the  absence  of  even  the  personal  mediation  of  power 
such  as  was  granted  to  the  first  disciples.  We  see  that 
the  only  powers  given  to  us  are  those  that  come  through 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      107 

the  commonest  channels.  PrayeE,  the  exercise  of  faith, 
the  soothing  effect  of  a  loving  heart — these  are  the 
weapons  of  Christian  service;  and  surely  these  are 
inferior  in  kind  to  the  virtue  that  issued  from  the  word 
of  our  Master.  Take  the  weapon  of  prayer.  We  be- 
lieve in  it.  What  a  solace  it  has  been  in  the  dark 
days  of  depression!  What  victories  church  workers 
have  won  by  its  promises!  Luther  by  Melancthon's 
bed ! — the  whole  ocean  of  his  love  is  poured  out  in  one 
mighty  stream  of  petition,  and  since  that  time  the 
church  of  Germany  has  believed  that  recovery  hung 
upon  his  words.  St.  Bernard,  preaching  and  pray- 
ing— and  disease  seemed  to  leave  the  tortured  bodies, 
and  sin  and  despair  the  minds  of  his  hearers.  No,  the 
superiority  of  works  did  not  lie  in  their  effects  on  the 
coarse  matter  of  the  world. 

Nor  can  we  find  the  new  element  in  the  impression 
made  on  the  popular  mind.  The  Evangelist  Mark 
ceases  not  to  remind  us  of  the  amazement  evoked  by 
Jesus'  miracles.  He  wrote  for  the  Latin  mind,  and 
the  Latin  mind  was  caught  by  the  symbol  of  force. 
Therefore,  he  records  the  effects  of  the  wondrous  works 
on  the  bystanders.  It  might  be  said  that  the  lust  for 
the  marvelous  was  a  symptom  of  the  times.  Men  were 
unscientific,  crude,  without  ability  to  analyze,  and 
whatever  was  a  little  out  of  the  ordinary  would  be 
sure  to  fasten  their  attention.  Such  miracles  as  Jesus 
did  would  be  out  of  place  today.  Today  observers 
would  be  inclined  to  repeat  Kenan's  skeptical  banter: 
"  Give  me  a  council  of  doctors  and  scientific  experts, 
and  if  they  examine  the  case  and  find  that  life  has  re- 
turned to  the  body,  I  shall  then  believe  in  miracle." 
As  a  matter  of  fact  the  same  kind  of  amazement  that 
followed  the  path  of  Jesus  follows  the  movements  of 


108  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Christian  physicians  today  in  India  and  China.  Not, 
of  course,  for  the  same  reason  but  because  the  un- 
tutored minds  of  the  East  are  not  as  advanced  as  ours 
in  the  knowledge  of  the  human  body,  and  hence  cannot 
see  how  the  impaired  system  reacts  to  the  stimulus  of 
certain  remedies  or  surgical  treatment. 

Furthermore,  wherever  the  church  has  wrought  in 
the  name  of  her  Lord  by  cure  of  soul  or  healing  of 
mind,  surprise  and  astonishment  have  greeted  her 
efforts,  quite  like  the  wonder  at  the  tomb  of  Lazarus 
or  at  Simon's  table  when  He  forgave  the  penitent 
Magdalen.  The  theater  of  achievement  has  been 
enormously  widened  since  Jesus  was  here.  He  looked 
into  the  mirror  of  His  own  nation,  though  here  and 
there  a  stranger  appeared.  But  take  away  the  Cen- 
turions and  the  Greeks  and  the  Syro-Phenecian  sup- 
pliant, and  you  see  how  narrow  racially  His  sphere 
was.  With  His  church  the  world  has  become  a  parish. 
People  of  every  race,  of  every  grade  of  development, 
of  every  degree  of  sinfulness,  have  heard  her  words 
and  seen  her  works.  Yet,  the  amazement  is  of  the 
same  type,  sometimes  the  bated  breath  of  surprise, 
sometimes  a  convulsion  of  soul  seismic  in  strength, 
changing  the  clod  of  bruted  matter  into  a  man. 

If  the  "  greater  works  "  are  not  wrought  on  nature, 
where  shall  we  look  for  their  impress  ?  The  only  other 
possible  domain  is  the  human  spirit.  It  is  here  that 
the  followers  of  Jesus  have  surpassed  His  majestic  serv- 
ice. I  speak  now  only  of  the  fact;  the  reason  will 
come  later.  We  have  just  noted  the  difference  in  scope 
in  the  two  ministries.  If  Jesus  had  lived  to  the  ripe 
age  of  Buddha  He  might  have  won  the  same  gallery 
of  adherents.  The  restless  activity  of  the  apostles  soon 
carried  the  Gospel  beyond  the  confines  of  Asia.    Mere 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      109 

extent  of  space  is  no  true  measure  of  superiority. 
Because  Russia  rules  over  the  largest  continental  area 
unbroken  in  its  borders,  she  is  not  thereby  accounted 
the  greatest,  that  is,  the  most  successful  nation  in 
morals,  industry,  or  intelligence.  Christ  did  not  seek 
to  cover  distance  or  He  might  Himself  have  entered 
the  precincts  of  the  Imperial  City.  Counting  miles, 
countries,  or  even  converts,  is  a  poor  way  to  set  forth 
the  mathematics  of  the  Christian  faith.  A  distin- 
guished missionary  statesman  declares :  "  I  had  rather 
plant  one  seed  of  the  life  of  Christ  under  the  crust  of 
heathen  life,  than  to  cover  the  whole  crust  over  with 
veneer  of  our  social  habits,  or  the  vestiture  of  Western 
civilization." 

How,  then,  does  the  church  surpass  the  work  of 
Jesus? 

1.  It  pierces  the  armor  of  religious  formalism  and 
sets  free  the  imprisoned  soul.  Christ  could  not  make 
any  deep  breach  in  the  self-righteousness  of  the  Phar- 
isee. He  had  one  or  two  inquirers  from  their  ranks, 
but  they  were  hesitating  and  uncertain.  The  voice  that 
Nicodemus  lifted  up  in  the  council-chamber  was  weak 
and  impermanent.  Joseph  waited  till  death  had 
claimed  its  victim  to  show  the  smallest  interest  in  the 
Prophet  of  Nazareth.  The  great  men  of  the  period 
refused  to  acknowledge  Him.  He  did  not  square  with 
their  ideas  of  Messianic  virtue.  He  stood  distinctly 
opposed  to  what  they  considered  vital  to  Hebrew  re- 
ligion. He  would  not  interpret  the  law  as  the  fathers 
did ;  He  would  not  bind  Himself  by  the  nicety  of  con- 
struction. He  was  independent  and  original,  and 
they  loved  nothing  so  much  as  loyalty  to  the  letter  of 
Scripture.     Therefore,  they  hated  the  new  Evangel 


110  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

and  its  Procl aimer,  and  their  criticism  extended  to 
the  children  who  cried  Hosanna  to  Him  in  the  Temple 
courts.  Jesus  could  do  no  mighty  work  among  the 
rulers ;  He  could  not  effect  a  profound  change  of  char- 
acter in  their  group.  His  efforts  to  purify  the  nation's 
life  at  its  fountainhead  were  dismal  failures.  We  can- 
not conceal  this  fact. 

But  with  the  disciples  carrying  the  Gospel  of  Par- 
don another  experience  is  manifest.  They  preached  the 
same  truth  embodied  in  the  same  Person,  and  only  a 
few  weeks  after  Jesus  did.  But  a  remarkable  differ- 
ence in  attitude  is  now  encountered.  It  has  something 
of  the  re-vamping  of  opinion  that  took  place  in  the 
Manchester  audience,  when  Beecher  assumed  to  jus- 
tify the  war  for  the  Union  which  had  paralyzed  the 
cotton  trade  in  England.  He  faced  a  bitter,  hostile, 
and  unimpressible  company,  but  his  flaming  eloquence, 
his  plea  for  right  and  honor,  his  picture  of  the  cruel 
and  merciless  traffic  of  slavery,  slowly  but  surely  loosed 
the  bars  of  prejudice  and  finally  won  his  reluctant 
hearers  into  sympathy.  I  suppose  that  no  greater 
miracle  of  grace  ever  took  place  than  when  the  priests 
at  Jerusalem  threw  down  their  pride,  their  love  for 
ancient  symbols,  and  bowed  before  the  Cross  of  Cal- 
vary. Yet  a  multitude  came,  forsaking  house  and 
profession,  creed  and  standing,  braving  contumely, 
anger,  and  even  death,  that  they  might  accept  the 
humble  Carpenter  as  their  Lord.  This  victory  Jesus 
could  not  win.  It  was  reserved  for  His  church.  It 
is  today  a  possible  achievement.  Religious  formalism 
is  as  invincible  now  as  in  the  time  of  the  apostles.  Saul 
of  Tarsus  lifts  his  head  proudly  above  the  fisher-folk 
who  fill  the  body  of  the  church;  but  Saul  of  Tarsus 
meets  his  noontide  flash  and    falls    conquered   and 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      111 

abashed  in  the  presence  of  his  King.  No  man  can 
justify  his  spiritual  life,  be  it  never  so  gorgeously  dec- 
orated with  the  trophies  of  penance  or  merit,  no  man 
can  justify  his  spiritual  life  or  boast  himself  of  its 
power,  when  once  he  has  matched  that  life  with  the 
seamless  beauty  of  the  Saviour's. 

2.  Again,  the  disciples  challenged  and  overcame 
pagan  immorality.  Jesus  could  not  do  it;  He  did  not 
try.  No  other  instrument  ever  penetrated  the  public 
depravity  and  healed  it.  Men  thought  that  a  pure 
form  of  government  might  do  it  but  they  were  disap- 
pointed. Men  trusted  in  a  fine  sample  of  philosophic 
virtue.  They  were  woefully  mistaken.  But  the  fol- 
lowers of  Jesus  came  with  His  Gospel,  went  down  into 
the  dregs  of  human  iniquity,  sought  entrance  into  the 
slave-pen,  the  den  of  vice,  the  very  "  sink  of  Rome," 
and  gave  new  heart  to  a  crumbling  civilization.  These 
humble,  uncultured  men,  only  a  few  in  number,  reck- 
lessly set  themselves  to  change  the  face  of  ancient  so- 
ciety. Christ  made  no  impression  on  the  great  world 
beyond  Nazareth.  Even  the  pagan  cities  of  the  De- 
capolis  had  no  ear  for  His  message.  The  tyrant  on  the 
imperial  throne  never  dreamed  that  a  meek  Enthusiast 
of  Jewry  would  eventually  compete  with  him  for  the 
possession  of  Rome.  Yet,  this  is  what  actually  oc- 
curred, and  not  by  force  of  arms  but  by  the  subtle 
persuasion  of  purity  as  over  against  the  disintegrat- 
ing forces  of  evil.  When  you  look  into  the  face  of 
Onesimus  and  hear  his  story,  learn  that  he  was  rescued 
from  the  slums  of  sin  into  which  despair  had  plunged 
him,  see  him  yielding  ready  submission  to  the  bond- 
master  whom  he  once  hated,  and  then  realize  that  the 
change  took  place  after  Paul  had  laid  the  hand  of 
Grace  upon  him, — what  can  restrain  the  lips  from  an 


112  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

exultant  cry :  Truly,  a  greater  work  hath  he  done,  than 
even  the  Lord  Himself  on  earth! 

3.  I  think  of  a  third  way,  in  which  the  superiority 
is  revealed,  very  different  in  form  from  the  others  but 
laden  with  rich  success.  I  mean  the  enshrining  of 
sacred  truth  in  Sacred  Writ.  It  must  startle  a  fol- 
lower of  the  false  prophet  to  be  told  that  Christ  wrote 
nothing.  Mohammed  crystallized  many  of  his  "  reve- 
lations" in  the  drops  that  flowed  from  his  pen.  He 
preserved  them  for  the  faithful  in  all  ages,  and  they 
might  be  tampered  with  only  on  pain  of  perdition.  But 
Jesus  Christ  does  not  live  by  written  word  alone;  He 
lives  by  the  inward  consecration  of  believers.  To  those 
men  who  are  warmed  and  inspired  by  contact  with 
truth.  He  commits  the  duty  of  record  and  interpre- 
tation. He  could  not  tell  the  story ;  they  could,  for  the 
story  would  be  complete  ere  they  began  to  write. 
From  such  men  comes  the  Book  which  more  than  any 
other  smites  conscience,  incites  to  love,  levels  up  so- 
ciety, opens  the  mind  to  knowledge,  and  gives  us  a 
just  idea  of  God.  "  Greater  works  than  these  shall 
he  do."  Greater  than  preaching,  greater  than  miracle, 
greater  even  than  the  vision  of  a  bodily  Christ  is  the 
influence  of  the  Bible  which  the  disciples  were  em- 
powered to  produce. 


II 

We  take  up  now  our  second  question,  and  this  may  be 
answered  more  concisely,  What  is  the  reason  for  the 
superiority  of  the  servant  over  his  Lord?  The  text 
avers :  "  Because  I  go  to  the  Father."  That  seems  to  be 
contradictory  on  the  face  of  it.  To  get  power  you  must 
come  in  contact  with  it.    To  feel  the  force  of  a  man's 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD     113 

personality  you  desire  to  be  in  his  company,  listen  to 
his  words,  get  his  point  of  view,  emulate  liis  example, 
steep  your  heart  in  the  atmosphere  of  his  thought.  It 
would  seem  as  though  Jesus  were  putting  an  end  to 
His  influence  by  departure,  thereby  reducing  to  a  min- 
imum the  possibility  of  His  followers  ever  arriving 
at  the  promised  goal.  But  let  us  look  into  His 
meaning. 

They  had  to  take  His  place.  They  were  not  called 
upon  to  baptize  with  John's  symbol  or  preach  with 
John's  austerity.  John  had  no  real  successor;  he 
needed  none.  Indeed,  for  the  matter  of  that  he  could 
have  none  because  his  work  was  preparatory,  and  you 
can  prepare  only  once.  They  were  not  called  upon  to 
"sit  in  Moses'  seat."  The  Pharisees  had  essayed  to 
sit  there  and  had  made  a  botch  of  it.  Doubtless,  John 
or  Nathaniel  or  Paul  might  have  ascended  the  Mosaic 
Bema  and  dispensed  royal  justice.  They  were  called 
upon  to  fill  a  more  difficult  position.  It  was  a  new 
age  to  which  they  must  speak;  it  was  a  new  truth 
which  they  must  interpret.  Anyone  who  has  succeeded 
to  the  honor  and  duty  of  a  distinguished  official  in 
church  or  state  knows  how  hard  is  the  task.  We  are 
unsettled  by  the  numerous  failures  which  history  has 
no  scruples  in  detailing.  For  example,  when  Abraham 
Lincoln  was  felled  by  the  assassin's  shot  his  place  was 
taken  by  a  man  in  every  respect  his  inferior.  We  do 
not  blame  Andrew  Johnson  so  much  for  his  collapse 
as  the  party  that  thought  him  big  enough  to  sit  by 
the  Emancipator's  side.  Hence,  it  comes  home  to  us 
with  solemnizing  force  that  we  are  today  in  the  place 
of  Christ,  and  the  world  must  judge  of  Him  largely 
through  our  persons.  We  sit  in  His  seat;  we  com- 
municate His  word;  we  reflect  His  life.     Can  Christ 


114  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

do  "  greater  works  "  through  us,  poor,  weak,  shivering 
mortals  of  earth? 

Well,  He  is  pursuing  the  work  whether  we  address 
our  energies  to  it  or  not.  Let  me  cite  two  channels  in 
which  the  current  grows  stronger.  I  am  persuaded, 
that  the  doctrine  of  Christianity  is  better  taught  today 
than  at  any  time  since  it  was  first  prescribed.  Let  us 
single  out  the  matter  of  social  salvation.  Here  is  a 
fact  that  may  very  easily  be  obscured.  Hotheads  and 
malcontents  are  twisting  its  terms  till  they  do  not 
convey  the  original  meaning  at  all.  It  is  true  that  no 
man  liveth  to  himself  and  no  man  dieth  to  himself; 
that  he  is  not  only  fixed  in  his  responsibility  to  God 
but  also  to  man.  I  can  conceive  of  a  believer  who 
having  tasted  of  the  water  of  life  secretes  himself  in 
the  caves  of  the  desert  and  refuses  to  help  another  up 
to  the  fountain.  But  how  paltry  and  shriveled  and 
out  of  joint  his  soul  must  be !  I  can  conceive  of  some 
satisfaction,  selfish  and  faint,  when  marriage  deliber- 
ately shuts  the  door  against  a  childish  voice  in  the 
home  or  the  pattering  footsteps  in  the  hall;  but  how 
incalculably  dull  and  languid  that  is  as  compared 
with  happiness  of  parents  and  children,  when  duty 
and  affection  vie  in  the  splendid  task  of  forming 
deathless  character!  Salvation  is  not  individual  and 
individual  only,  as  a  medieval  theology  might  seem 
to  dictate.  Salvation  is  a  matter  of  twos  and  threes 
and  hundreds,  and  ultimately  of  a  renovated  earth. 
It  has  taken  a  great  many  generations  to  think  this 
thought  out  and  it  will  take  many  more  to  work  it  into 
the  warp  and  woof  of  Christian  practice.  I  am  per- 
suaded that  in  this  cardinal  theme  the  disciple  had  a 
"  greater  work "  than  was  possible  for  the  Lord  in 
His  human  career. 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      115 

The  second  channel  where  the  current  strengthens  is 
that  of  actual  service.  We  can  do  more  work  than 
Jesus  could,  so  He  affirms.  How?  Because  now 
Christ  is  broken  up,  so  to  say,  in  a  myriad  of  forces 
scattered  over  the  whole  earth  instead  of  being  con- 
solidated in  Palestine.  Paul  calls  Christ  the  head 
and  the  church  His  body.  Get  the  intent  of  that 
symbol.  We  are  not  all  the  same  kind  of  member 
nor  do  we  possess  the  same  kind  of  function.  It  takes 
an  indefinite  number  of  parts  and  organs  to  make 
up  the  human  system;  but  when  they  belong  to  the 
same  person,  they  act  in  perfect  harmony  and  evince 
the  glorious  force  which  we  call  Life.  From  this 
point  of  view  it  is  not  the  single  believer  but  the  vast 
company  whom  no  man  can  number,  who  have  washed 
their  robes,  and  made  them  white  in  the  blood  of  the 
Lamb,  to  whom  the  tribute  is  spoken :  "  He  shall  do 
greater  works."  I  am  deeply  thankful  for  this  hint. 
It  proves  the  unity  of  the  riven  church;  and  it  gives 
assurance  that  however  skeptics  may  doubt  the  mission 
of  the  church  and  however  deep  may  be  the  discour- 
agement that  sometimes  falls  upon  the  members,  we 
may  rest  in  this  confidence :  They  shall  be  mine,  in  the 
day  when  I  make  up  my  jewels ! 

So  far  we  have  spoken  of  the  Lord's  departure  in  its 
effect  on  the  disciples ;  now  let  us  view  it  as  it  affects 
his  own  career.  We  arrive  at  the  crux  of  the  problem. 
We  stand,  as  it  were,  behind  the  scenes  with  the  great 
Artificer  of  our  salvation  and  watch  Him  adjust  the 
levers  to  the  working  out  of  the  desired  end.  The 
query  is  not  alone,  why  the  church  will  do  mightier 
works  than  Jesus,  but  why  He  could  not  do  those 
works  Himself.    The  solution  is  simple, — a  few,  unim- 


116  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

pressive  words,  but  Life  and  death  hang  upon  them; 
"  because  I  go  to  the  Father." 

"  I  go," — how  did  He  go?  Did  He  rise  with  Elijah 
in  the  flaming  chariot  and  escape  the  bands  of  the 
grave?  Did  He  disappear  suddenly  from  the  haunts 
of  men,  and  ascend  the  solemn  hill, 

"  To  lie  in  state,  while  angek  wait, 
With  stars  for  tapers  tall "? 

He  went  to  death, — yes  to  death.  He  learned  the 
mysterious  secrets  of  the  tomb.  He  found  what  it 
means  to  sever  soul  from  body,  to  go  alone  through  the 
corridors  of  the  unknown  world.  But  how  did  He  go 
to  death?  Was  it  with  pomp  and  show,  with  pageant 
and  catafalque,  with  mourning  thousands  and  draped 
cortege  ?  Did  He  go  as  a  prince  or  an  honored  teacher, 
attended  by  the  wise  and  powerful  of  earth?  I  stood 
with  head  uncovered  one  day  in  the  streets  of  Athens 
as  the  bier  of  a  minister  of  state  was  carried  by.  The 
King  of  Greece  walked  in  procession  with  the  exalted 
of  his  realm  to  pay  the  final  tribute  to  their  dead. 
Did  Jesus  go  from  earth  in  company  such  as  this? 
Well,  what  was  the  meaning  of  His  going,  and  why 
should  He  make  His  grave  with  the  wicked  and  with 
the  rich  in  His  death?  You  will  find  an  interpre- 
tation of  the  Cross  in  our  present  verse.  The  men  of 
Christian  loyalty  could  not  do  the  "  greater  works," 
until  the  Cross  of  Golgotha  had  nailed  the  sin  of  the 
world  to  its  head.  The  Cross  was  like  the  electric 
spark  rushing  with  incalculable  speed  to  the  fuse, 
that  communicated  with  the  underlaid  explosives, — 
and  in  a  twinkling  Hell  Gate  was  a  mass  of  ruins. 
Men  can  now  preach  Christ  and  get  converts,  for  the 
adamant  rock  of  human  perversity  has  been  shivered. 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      117 

Do  you  believe  it?  Do  you  know  it?  Have  you  tried 
it  on  your  neighbor?  Have  you  seen  the  cataclysmic 
movements  in  a  soul,  when  the  Cross  of  Christ  con- 
victs of  sin? 

"  I  go,"  says  Jesus, — but  whither  did  He  go?  Did 
He  go  simply  to  that 

"  undiscovered  country 
From  whose  bourne  no  traveler  e'er  returns?" 

Did  He  sink  into  the  embrace  of  a  Pantheistic  God, 
an  ocean  of  eternity  so  dear  to  the  fancy  of  the  Hindu 
worshipper?  Did  He  take  His  place  as  inhabitant  of 
the  Other  World,  level  in  rank  with  Moses  and  David, 
and  Isaiah,  with  Socrates  and  right-loving  Cato?  If 
that  is  all  we  may  close  our  Bibles,  and  form  a  league 
with  Matthew  Arnold  or  Arnold  Bennett.  If  that  is 
all  it  matters  not  what  church  you  espouse,  what 
creed  you  follow,  what  kind  of  ethical  life  you  live.  If 
that  is  all  I  cannot  see  what  difference  it  makes, 
whether  you  have  the  Paradise  of  Mohammed,  or  the 
oblivion  of  the  Buddha,  or  the  unvarnished  agnos- 
ticism of  Frederic  Harrison. 

Or,  did  the  Lord  return  to  His  primeval  glory?  Did 
He  resume  His  interrupted  place  in  the  Godhead? 
Did  He  connect  Himself  up  with  the  powers  He  once 
exercised,  and  now  having  shaken  off  the  sorrows 
and  limitations  of  earth  begin  the  eternal  campaign 
for  the  regeneration  of  mankind?  Going  to  the 
Father  must  have  this  significance  or  it  has  none.  It 
means,  that  Christ  is  now  in  a  position  to  do  the 
works,  which  in  His  human  state  He  was  forbidden 
to  do.  Read  the  New  Testament  to  get  this  view. 
Strip  off  all  the  figures  of  speech, — the  mediatorial 
powers,  the  standing  at  the  right  hand  of  God,  the 


118  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

slain  Lamb,  the  humanized  Deity,  who  gleams  from 
the  sacred  Candlestick.  Strip  off  the  incidentals  and 
get  at  the  core.  Leave  behind  for  the  time  all  the 
contradictions  of  logic,  all  the  fallacies  of  argument, 
which  men  have  found  in  the  deity  of  Jesus.  And 
remember  now  His  promise  of  perpetual  presence. 
Remember  the  symptoms  of  power  which  He  evinced 
even  in  His  earth-life.  Remember  the  call  of  St.  Paul 
and  the  visions  of  John  on  Patmos.  Remember  the 
nineteen  centuries  of  Christian  service  and  the  un- 
impaired triumphs  of  the  church.  Remember  the  lat- 
est coalescence  of  Christian  sympathy,  as  nation  after 
nation  has  sought  and  found  relief  at  the  base  of 
Calvary.  Here  lies  the  secret  of  the  disciple's  supe- 
riority over  his  Lord.  Not  the  church's  secular  power, 
not  a  fortunate  combination  of  circumstances,  not 
merely  a  decayed  world  that  can  get  help  from  no 
other  source  and  by  sheer  desperation  is  driven  to 
this, — not  these,  but  the  exalted,  crowned,  and  be- 
nevolent King  puts  into  human  effort  the  solemn 
certainty  of  heaven. 

It  is  said  that  during  the  critical  battle  of  Gettys- 
burg, the  Union  general  was  stationed  in  the  cupola 
of  the  theological  seminary,  and  from  that  point  of 
vantage  directed  the  conflict.  Every  corps  of  his  army 
was  within  sight,  every  movement  could  be  detected. 
The  needy  points  were  assisted,  the  exposed  battalions 
were  covered.  Some  possible  rendezvous  was  quickly 
marked  and  an  important  outpost  surely  determined. 
Word  went  forth  through  the  army,  "  Meade  is  watch- 
ing us  from  above."  Nerves  grew  stronger,  faltering 
hearts  took  courage,  the  enemy's  advances  like  Pick- 
ett's charge  were  met  with  unflinching  resistance,  and 
victory  at  length  was  on  their  side.     A  more  crucial 


SERVANT  SURPASSING  HIS  LORD      119 

struggle  is  before  us  in  the  world.  The  brigades  of 
the  army  are  deployed  here  and  there.  The  fight  is 
real,  bitter,  to  the  death.  But  over  us,  with  loving 
eye,  watches  the  Great  Commander,  and  from  His 
lips  ever  and  anon  comes  the  word  of  cheer  to  fainting 
souls : 


"Verily,  verily,  I  say  xinto  you;  he  that  believeth  on  me,  the 
works  that  I  do  shall  he  do  also;  and  greater  works  than  these 
shall  he  do,  because  I  go  unto  the  Father." 


T 


VIII 
THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME 

John  Ut  :H.    "  If  ye  ask  anything  in  my 
name,  I  will  do  it." 

HE  splendor  of  the  promise  is  overwhelming. 
We  seem  ushered  into  the  realm  of  magic  with 
an  Arabian  lamp  in  our  hand  and  a  golden 
key  to  unlock  the  treasures  of  hope.  To  have  what- 
ever one  might  wish  is  the  consummation  of  bliss  to 
childhood.  To  the  grown  man  the  substance  of  the 
wish  is  changed  but  the  lust  for  its  fulfillment  is  un- 
abated. Wealth,  fame,  glory,  rank,  culture,  long  life 
and  friendships,  and  when  these  are  finished,  as  fin- 
ished they  must  be,  then  a  serene  abode  on  the  hills  of 
Paradise,  and  its  winsome  delights,  a  perfecting  of  the 
joys  below, — this  is  the  desire  of  the  heart,  an  Eldo- 
rado to  our  dreams ;  and  this  we  may  expect  to  obtain 
according  to  the  terms  of  the  promise. 

But  we  are  going  too  fast.  The  assurance  is  qual- 
ified. It  is  not  a  bald,  bare  guaranty  of  every  human 
whim  and  fancy.  In  fact,  the  will  of  the  petitioner 
has  little  to  do  with  the  answer.  Prayer  or  the  ex- 
pression of  wish  is  a  different  exercise  from  the  rub- 
bing of  a  magician's  ring.  Prayer  is  intercourse  with 
the  holy  Presence  of  God.  Prayer  consolidates  the 
forces  of  the  praying  mind  and  directs  them  to  a 
proper  end.  Prayer  moved  by  the  divine  Spirit  veri- 
fies the  promise  of  the  text. 
We  consider,  first,  the  instrument  of  prayer,  and 

secondly,  the  grounds  for  its  success. 
120 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  121 


The  instrument  of  prayer  is  a  name. 

It  is  a  settled  canon  in  social  exchange  that  no  re- 
quest may  be  preferred  save  on  the  basis  of  a  just 
claim.  Such  claim  may  be  of  the  simplest  form, — a 
long  acquaintance,  a  mutual  friend,  a  favor  done  in 
early  days.  We  are  by  instinct  quick  to  seize  on  some 
primordial  obligation,  as  one  that  creates  the  best  at- 
mosphere. There  are  also  secondary  claims,  and  men 
of  political  skill  know  the  value  of  these.  I  should 
hesitate  long,  and  study  the  matter  earnestly,  ere  I 
made  up  my  mind  to  go  to  the  President  and  ask  a 
government  position  for  my  friend.  I  could  plead  the 
merits  of  his  capacity,  his  integrity,  and  his  past 
service;  I  might  appeal  to  the  welfare  of  the  nation — 
the  patriotic  argument — in  support  of  my  request. 
But  I  would  know  that  if  another  applicant  of  equal 
merit  had  the  support  of  men  better  known  to  the 
President,  men  to  whom  the  President  looked  for 
advice  in  consideration  of  past  experiences,  such  an 
applicant  would  stand  a  better  chance  of  securing  the 
prize.  It  would  not  be  a  case  of  favoritism ;  it  would 
be  a  question  of  claim,  and  I  should  bow  willingly  to 
the  decision.  The  point  is,  every  request  bears  the 
marks  of  recommendation.  Now  it  is  the  beauty  of  a 
Persian  queen  that  gives  the  suppliant  room  in  the 
royal  presence;  anon  it  is  the  recollection  of  an  unen- 
viable past,  the  skeleton  in  the  closet,  that  may  be 
dragged  out  into  the  light  of  day  by  a  woman's  revenge, 
that  does  the  deadly  deed  to  the  fearless  Baptist.  Or, 
again,  it  is  an  undying  affection  such  as  bound  David 
and  his  friend  that  mediates  every  request. 

We  hesitate  to  bring  the  truisms  of  life  into  the 


122  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

sphere  of  religion.  Perhaps  the  expedients  of  earth 
are  not  in  place  here.  We  would  rid  the  solemn  office 
of  prayer  of  such  crude  and  debasing  elements. 
Weights  and  scales,  claims  and  reasons,  mercenary 
adjustment  of  a  sacred  relation, — these  surely  cloud 
the  issue  and  hinder  our  approach  to  God.  W^hat  claim 
may  we  prefer  as  ground  for  divine  favor?  We  are  not 
worshippers  of  Baal  trying  by  the  spattered  blood  of 
bulls,  by  the  mutilation  of  body,  by  the  drill  of  fire  to 
prove  our  right  to  be  heard.  And  yet  sincere  hearts 
have  found  a  good  deal  of  peace  at  the  smoking  altar. 
The  temple  of  ancient  Israel  was  the  shrine  of  holy 
grace.  Humble  souls  brought  their  offerings  for  sin 
and  sought  atonement  by  them.  If  we  accept  the 
revelation  of  the  Old  Testament  we  must  accept  the 
scheme  of  sacrifice,  and  that  means — to  speak  plainly 
—establishing  a  claim  on  God.  "  Bring  ye  all  the 
tithes  into  the  storehouse  "  is  the  quid  pro  quo  exacted 
of  Judah  for  the  opened  windows  of  blessing.  Reli- 
gion is  the  scene  of  exchange.  It  is  not  the  channel  of 
divine  benediction  unmixed  with  human  endeavor. 
Faith  that  cannot  lead  to  works  is  a  poor  specimen  of 
Christian  loyalty  and  soon  withers  away  under  the 
blaze  of  criticism.  Jesus  condemned  the  fig-tree  for 
its  pretense. 

We  are  right,  then,  in  looking  for  some  gateway  to 
the  spiritual  citadel.  There  is  only  one,  though  men 
have  peered  about  its  walls  and  parapets  to  discover 
other  and  more  acceptable  ascents.  The  ancient 
fortress  had  just  one  gangway  to  its  halls.  If  you 
go  to  the  ruins  of  Mykenae  in  the  Peleponnesus,  you 
must  pass  up  the  winding  approach  to  the  narrow 
gate,  where  today  as  in  her  prime  stand  the  frowning 
lions,  monitors,  guardians  of  the  inner  court.    There 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  123 

was  no  other  entrance  to  the  castle,  and  in  those 
ancient  times  when  warfare  was  by  hand  only  time 
could  slay  the  heroic  defenders  of  hearth  and  home. 
Listen  to  the  parable  here  unfolded.  The  heart  of  God 
is  the  citadel  of  truth.  Men  have  tried  by  innumerable 
devices  to  force  an  entrance  in  their  own  way.  They 
have  failed.  It  may  be,  you  are  doing  it  today.  If 
you  are,  let  me  assure  you  at  once, — ^you  cannot  i-juc- 
ceed.  The  dexterous,  many-sided  mind  of  Saul  met  a 
crushing  defeat.  The  religious  experimenter  of  the 
present  age  can  do  no  better.  Saul  of  Tarsus  had  ad- 
vantages which  few  men  today  possess.  He  had  be- 
hind a  long  and  distinguished  line  of  experts  trained 
in  the  arts  of  religion.  He  had  the  gathered  wealth  of 
worldly  learning  which  here  and  there,  as  he  himself 
admits,  flashed  out  a  facet-glint  of  truth.  Yet,  he 
could  not  find  a  way  to  God  that  satisfied  him  alto- 
gether. 

Did  you  ever  investigate  the  forms  which  the  quest 
of  prayer  develops?  What  do  you  plead,  when  you 
get  down  on  your  knees  in  a  cool  moment  and  ask 
for  help?  The  glamour  of  life  passes  and  the  shadows 
of  a  devout  reverence  are  about  you.  What  makes  you 
think  you  will  be  heard  by  heaven?  What  gives  your 
weary  heart  a  sort  of  bracing  hope?  Think  over  the 
claims  you  might  make,  you  do  make,  and  test  their 
validity.  If  you  wish  to  open  a  secret  drawer  in  the 
desk,  you  may  be  hard  put  about.  Every  key  refuses 
to  release  the  spring;  pressure  is  without  avail.  Then, 
you  suddenly  come  upon  the  device  made  by  the  joiner, 
by  which,  perhaps,  you  move  a  piece  of  wood  hitherto 
unnoticed,  and  presto !  out  comes  the  drawer.  The  way 
to  the  throne  is  hedged  with  diflSculties.  Not  every 
pretext  can  find  it.    Not  every  mind  is  keen  enough  or 


124  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

humble  enough  to  find  it;  but  when  once  discovered 
what  glorious  revelations  await  the  eager  eye! 

Well,  study  the  matter  for  a  moment  or  two.  I  pray 
to  God,  because  I  am  a  child  of  His  by  nature.  It  is  He 
who  gave  me  form  and  life  and  soul  and  speech  and 
a  place  in  the  world  to  occupy.  Therefore,  I  have 
a  substantial  claim  on  Him,  as  every  child  has  on 
his  parent.  Common  law  recognizes  the  duty  of  a 
father  to  care  for  his  child.  Can  the  heavenly  Father 
do  less  than  that?  But  then,  there  is  a  reverse 
side:  God  has  a  duty,  so  have  I.  Is  my  duty  per- 
fectly performed?  And  on  the  basis  of  duty  done 
may  I  hold  Him  to  His  natural  covenant?  Or,  per- 
haps we  are  inclined  to  press  the  claim  from  the  point 
of  view  of  our  moral  relations.  We  believe  in  the 
moral  administration  of  the  world.  Despite  the 
invective  of  Mr.  Arnold  that  a  Moral  Governor  at  the 
head  of  the  natural  system  is  unthinkable,  we  be- 
lieve in  the  moral  authority  of  God.  We  refuse  to 
think  of  Him  as  a  cosmic  Caesar,  with  the  mailed  hand 
of  tyranny  on  His  every  subject.  That  would  stamp  us 
as  in  sympathy  with  Islam,  and  Islam  has  no  mes- 
sage for  a  progressive  soul.  No,  we  catch  the  beat  of 
moral  purpose;  we  hear  the  swell  of  the  far-off  tide 
which  moves  towards  us  in  ever  growing  cadences  of 
inspiration,  intoning  the  righteousness  of  God  and  His 
moral  fellowship  with  us.  Still,  how  can  the  worn  and 
battered  soul  with  its  broken  pledges  and  its  selfish 
hopes  ever  stand  in  the  presence  of  the  Holy  King, 
and  plead  the  sanctity  of  his  moral  obligation?  It  is 
impossible,  and  we  may  as  well  get  over  the  delusion. 
Moral  or  mechanical,  whatever  His  relation  to  us  is, 
we  cannot  appeal  to  the  throne  on  the  basis  of  mere 
essential  likeness. 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  125 

Then,  I  hear  the  case  pressed  from  another  angle. 
The  claim  now  is  personal,  not  general.  It  is  what 
we  are  or  have  been  or  have  done  or  our  family  have 
achieved  or  are  credited  with  achieving  that  supports 
the  claim.  The  complacence  of  the  Pharisee  has  a 
seat  in  every  breast.  You  have  a  piece  of  it,  and  so 
have  I.  If  we  do  not  acknowledge  it  Christ  will  ac- 
knowledge it  for  us.  He  enshrined  it  in  amber,  the 
amber  of  a  parable.  He  wrote  the  history  of  the  type 
in  a  very  few  words.  Not  long  since  a  modern  apol- 
ogist argued  that  Jesus  was  not  a  fair  critic,  nor  a 
competent  historian;  He  was  prejudiced;  He  had  mis- 
judged a  noble  scion  of  the  Jewish  race.  We  answer. 
All  the  men  of  Gamaliel's  school  may  not  have  been 
like  this  one;  but  this  one  typifies  the  self-righteous 
soul  in  every  race  and  in  every  age.  It  is  he  who 
can  go  to  God  and  argue  for  a  favor  on  the  ground 
of  past  record.  Can  you  do  so?  Would  you  ven- 
ture to  take  your  life  for  the  past  year  and  lay  it 
down  before  High  Heaven  and  demand  consideration, 
because  of  its  spiritual  beauty?  You  smile  at  the 
suggestion.  Yet  that  is  the  very  course  multitudes 
are  taking  today.  "I  have  done  the  best  I  could; 
what  more  can  be  expected?"  What  a  sham  for 
religious  excellence !  "  Done  the  best  you  could,"  and 
expect  to  get  paid  on  the  preferment  of  that  claim! 
"  Done  the  best  you  could !  " — got  the  better  of  your 
neighbor  in  a  bargain;  raised  a  suspicion  about  your 
neighbor's  motive  that  you  might  get  the  job  over 
his  head;  refused  to  help  that  poor  man,  who  needed 
a  lift  at  the  moment;  supposed  that  a  single  hour 
in  church  during  the  week  covered  absolutely  all 
the  religious  service  you  were  required  to  give!  Do 
you  venture  to   think   that   a   claim   like   this   will 


126  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

be  honored  by  the  Throne,  whose  glorious  code  is 
to  love  your  heavenly  Father  and  your  neighbor  as 
yourself?  If  you  are  clothed  in  such  armor  to  fight 
your  way  up  to  the  sacred  citadel,  you  will  find  it 
nothing  but  papier-ma,ch§,  pierced  and  melted  by  your 
own  pretense. 

No,  the  road  to  the  Holy  Presence  does  not  lie 
through  slender  claims  like  these.  We  must  look 
higher.  We  will  try  out  the  meaning  of  this  verse. 
"  If  ye  shall  ask  anything  in  my  name,"  says  Jesus. 
The  emphasis  is  on  "  Name."  It  has  a  ring  of  con- 
fidence. We  know  the  value  of  a  name  in  introduction. 
If  you  bear  the  card  of  an  influential  Senator,  you  will 
encounter  no  opposition  in  entering  the  private  oflSces 
of  any  department  of  government.  If  you  speak  the 
magic  name  of  a  distinguished  author,  your  right  to  a 
place  in  the  councils  of  literary  workers  is  undisputed. 
We  see  today  millions  of  souls  gathered  about  the 
magnetic  syllables  of  a  single  name,  for  example,  Mo- 
hammed. We  follow  the  movements  of  thought  and 
are  amazed  how  many  currents  are  focused  in  the 
work  of  a  single  thinker,  for  example,  Calvin.  Men 
love  to  be  grouped  under  a  familiar  personal  slogan, 
just  as  loyal  subjects  love  to  circle  about  their  liege. 
There  are  strong  reasons  why  such  centripetal  influ- 
ences are  at  work.  The  name  is  electric  with  attractive 
energy. 

But  can  this  be  true  of  the  name  which  Jesus  bore? 
And  can  it  be  true  on  an  infinitely  higher  platform 
than  those  we  have  just  considered?  To  do  the  work 
in  view  His  name  must  be  higher  than  Moses',  who 
gave  the  law,  or  Abraham's,  who  founded  the  nation, 
or  David's,  who  organized  the  kingdom,  or  Isaiah's, 
who  read  the  future.    It  must  not  be  a  name  stained 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  12T 

with  earth's  lust  or  fired  by  earth's  ambitions ;  it  must 
not  deal  with  the  trivial  hints  of  court  or  camp,  or  the 
passing  gleams  of  a  human  philosophy;  it  must  not 
even  be  the  royal  name  of  the  true  prophet  who  is  able 
to  give  a  genuine  reward  for  favors  received,  namely, 
the  peace  of  God.  The  Name  that  is  to  set  going  cur- 
rents of  almighty  power  must  be  an  Almighty  Name. 
This  fact  carries  us  into  the  heart  of  Hebrew  faith. 
They  had  a  Name,  which  stood  to  them  in  that  relation. 
In  Jesus'  time  men  spoke  it  with  bated  breath,  if  at 
all.  Indeed,  the  common  custom  was  to  offer  another 
name  in  its  place, — Adonai,  my  Lord,  and  not  "  I  am 
that  I  am."  Could  it  be  that  Jesus  claimed  the  right 
to  assume  the  functions  of  that  Name? 

The  use  of  names  among  the  Jews  was  a  piece  of 
sublime  poetry.  Every  name  for  man  or  angel  had  a 
subtle  meaning;  it  betokened  its  owner's  character. 
Jacob  meant  "  supplanter,"  for  that  was  the  stamp 
of  his  life.  Isaiah  meant,  the  "  Lord  the  Saviour,"  for 
the  prophet  preached  the  ultimate  safety  of  his  people. 
Thus,  God's  two  supreme  names  were  graven  with 
His  holy  nature;  and  they  recorded  the  two  phases  of 
His  revelation,  first,  Elohim,  God  the  mighty,  the 
Author  of  the  world;  secondly,  Jehovah,  the  Ever- 
living,  who  keepeth  Covenant  with  His  people.  And 
now  do  we  have  a  third  Name  for  the  Holy  One?  Is 
Jesus'  Name  to  be  written  on  the  sky,  as  the  latest 
demonstration  of  its  glory  in  the  eyes  of  men?  The 
apostles  so  understood  its  letters,  and  with  incorrigible 
faith  proclaimed  its  absolute  power.  "  None  other 
Name "  is  the  watchword  of  the  youthful  church. 
"  None  other  Name  "  is  the  word  heralded  over  the  seas, 
to  Athens,  the  seat  of  culture,  and  to  Rome,  the  seat  of 
power.     They  drew  their  reasons  for  its  mysterious 


128  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

charm  from  the  language  of  the  Lord  Himself.  He 
used  it  lavishly  in  the  last  discourses.  He  came  in 
His  Father's  name;  He  sent  them  forth  in  His  own. 
Formerly,  these  innocent  disciples  had  asked  nothing 
in  His  name ;  now  they  were  to  shake  the  world  by  its 
potent  syllables.  Once  they  drew  near  to  God  in  the 
solemn  awe  of  the  ancient  temple,  where  in  olden 
times  the  Shekinah  dwelt;  now,  they  were  to  empower 
their  prayers  by  the  use  of  His  triumphant  Name.  The 
change  is  stupendous,  and  we  cannot  wonder  that  the 
faithful  Jew  was  likely  to  rank  Christ  either  as  a  man 
with  spent  reason  or  as  a  desperate  blasphemer. 

We  get  our  instructions  for  prayer  in  this  text: 
Ask  in  my  Name!  What  could  Jesus  mean  by  the 
charge?  What  do  you  make  out  of  it  as  a  rule  of 
religious  life?  It  is  perfectly  apparent  that  the  reci- 
tation of  a  name  even  so  holy  as  this  can  of  itself  bring 
no  answer.  God  is  not  wooed  by  words.  The  most 
lovelorn  maiden  asks  of  her  suitor  something  more 
than  poetic  phrase  and  gilded  promises.  The  modern 
king  of  finance  solicits  something  more  substantial 
than  hypothetical  statements.  You  cannot  get  him 
to  invest  cold  cash  in  a  company  that  intends  to  trade 
on  air.  I  see  no  reason  why  God  may  not  expect 
some  better  assurance  from  His  petitioners  than  the 
mere  rehearsal  of  formulas.  The  only  objection  I 
have  to  liturgical  prayers  is  that  being  written  by 
someone  other  than  the  user  they  lack  the  spring,  the 
warmth,  the  vigor,  the  elasticity  of  a  prayer  born  of 
private  need.  You  cannot  expect  to  be  filled  with 
power,  if  you  follow  mimetically  the  course  of  words 
and  do  not  make  them  live  by  the  splendor  of  a  heart's 
devotion. 

To  pray  "  in  the  name  "  of  Jesus  is  not  to  repeat  its 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  129 

sounds.  That  would  be  magic,  a  Christianized  sorcery. 
The  meaning  is  deeper,  and  is  twofold.  It  means, 
first,  that  he  who  prays  thus  represents  Christ,  stands 
in  His  stead,  confesses  His  revealed  position  as  the 
Son  of  God,  and  acknowledges  His  supreme  authority. 
The  Christian  must  represent  his  Lord, — present  Him 
to  others,  present  Him  to  God,  and  as  the  text  shows 
present  Him  to  Himself  in  heaven.  No  mistake  must 
be  made  in  the  act.  A  duty  like  this  is  assumed  by 
the  ambassador,  when  he  carries  a  message  from  his 
sovereign  to  another  prince.  It  was  this  office  that 
Benjamin  Franklin  discharged  to  the  French  court 
for  nine  years  with  such  conspicuous  success.  He 
stood  for  the  Republic  of  the  West,  a  new  type  of 
government,  at  once  the  joy  and  vexation  of  the  whole 
earth.  The  responsibility  of  our  duty  as  Christian 
petitioners  is  now  disclosed.  When  you  pray  you  may 
pray  only  for  those  things  that  minister  to  the  growth 
of  His  kingdom.  Hence,  many  of  the  prayers  we  have 
used  consciously  or  unconsciously  for  generations  must 
drop  out  of  the  book.  They  never  have  been  answered, 
and  they  never  can  be.  They  are  contrary  to  the  work 
of  Jesus  as  the  Son  of  God.  And  many  of  the  bigger 
things  we  have  deliberately  passed  by  will  now  rise  and 
demand  a  place.  We  have  prayed  that  the  kingdom 
might  come  and  never  understood  what  its  coming 
might  entail.  We  see  now  that  to  have  the  kingdom 
would  dispossess  us  of  some  of  our  property,  nip  in 
the  bud  some  pleasant  financial  prospect,  dispute  some 
of  our  claims  to  greatness,  change  much  of  our  social 
life,  kill  the  germ  of  rivalry  which  is  eating  out  the 
heart  of  nations,  and  make  brotherhood  a  reality,  not 
a  poet's  dream.  That  is  one  meaning  of  the  phrase  "  in 
my  Name." 


130  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

The  second  meaning  carries  with  it  the  acceptance 
of  Christ's  ideals.  To  pray  in  His  name  we  must  live 
in  His  name.  Well,  one  of  His  most  pronounced  traits, 
perhaps  the  most  pronounced,  was  sacrifice.  It  was 
contrary  to  the  genius  of  the  world  He  came  to  save. 
The  men  who  moved  the  earth  in  His  day  did  it  by  the 
very  opposite  quality — by  physical  power,  the  assertion 
of  self.  To  them  the  Superman  was  the  sole  possible 
candidate  for  greatness.  To  Jesus  personal  fortunes 
were  secondary.  He  sought  the  welfare  of  mankind. 
If  you  pray  His  prayer  and  in  His  name  you  must  show 
the  same  trait.  Can  you  do  it?  Are  you  ready  to  do 
it?  The  French  people  have  placed  in  their  Pantheon 
statues  to  the  six  devoted  citizens  of  Calais.  The  story 
is  full  of  grave  fascination.  King  Edward's  troops 
and  ships  beleaguered  the  city  for  a  year  and  captured 
it  only  after  the  most  stubborn  defense.  The  valorous 
garrison  was  granted  reprieve  on  condition  that  six 
men  should  be  chosen  to  suffer  the  king's  wrath. 
The  joy  at  release  was  turned  into  the  darkest  sorrow, 
until  the  Burgess  followed  by  five  others  offered  him- 
self as  sacrifice  for  the  town.  With  halters  about  their 
necks  they  were  led  into  the  presence  of  the  monarch. 
His  rage  was  unbounded.  Expostulation,  serious  coun- 
sels, pleadings  by  his  court  were  of  no  avail.  Then  the 
queen,  though  in  delicate  state,  flung  herself  on  her 
knees  and  besought  the  life  of  the  freemen.  Edward 
could  not  resist  the  gentle  tones  of  her  request: 

"  Lady,  I  would  rather  you  had  been  otherwhere ;  you  pray  so 
tenderly,  that  I  dare  not  refuse  you;  and  though  I  do  it  against 
my  will,  nevertheless  take  them,  I  give  them  to  you." 

Sacrifice  for  another  was  the  chosen  lot  of  Jesus.  If 
you  pray  in  His  name,  you  must  not  decline  to  deny 
yourself  and  even  lay  down  your  life  for  the  cause. 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  131 

II 

The  use  of  the  Divine  Name  means  success  in  prayer. 
This  is  the  other  theme  of  the  text.  Its  notes  are 
familiar.  Multitudes  of  books  have  been  written  on 
the  elements  of  "  prevailing  "  prayer.  Every  Christian 
biography  is  seamed  with  incidents  looking  to  that 
end.  Some  of  these,  let  us  confess,  are  far  from  the 
point.  Prayer  may  lose  its  beauty  by  fixing  the  eye 
on  the  results  and  forgetting  the  method  of  reaching 
them.  I  think  we  need  a  caution  in  this  respect.  I 
have  come  to  believe  that  if  we  judge  prayer  solely  by 
its  results  we  mistake  its  whole  meaning.  George 
Mueller  can  make  his  systematic  petitions  for  monies 
to  run  his  various  orphanages  and  credit  every  return 
to  the  same  account.  The  China  Inland  Mission  can 
refuse  to  organize  its  finances  under  committee  or 
board  and  depend  on  voluntary  and  unsolicited  offer- 
ings,— depend,  that  is  to  say,  on  the  returns  from  the 
office  of  prayer.  I  am  not  hinting  that  true  prayer 
may  not  secure  such  returns ;  nor  am  I  suggesting  that 
it  is  a  vain  exercise  thus  to  indulge.  You  must  suit 
your  custom  to  your  own  feeling.  But  we  are  faced 
with  the  trenchant  fact  that  equally  pious  men  pray 
for  the  same  results  in  different  spheres;  and  to  one 
the  results  are  given,  to  the  other  not.  The  most  se- 
rious prayer  ever  uttered  on  this  earth  was  negatived 
to  its  last  syllable.  Jesus  prayed,  "  Let  this  cup  pass 
from  me."  He  had  to  drink  it.  But  He  also  prayed, 
"  Not  my  will,  but  thine  be  done,"  and  the  answer  to 
this  was  a  glorious  vindication  of  divine  love  and 
divine  sacrifice. 

Look  at  the  matter  from  another  angle.  Prayer  is 
not  a  short  line  to  the  goal.    When  the  Czar  of  Russia 


132  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

projected  a  railway  from  Petrograd  to  Moscow,  he  ap- 
pointed engineers  to  draw  up  the  plans.  They  were 
submitted  to  him,  showing  how  this  mountain,  that 
lake,  must  be  avoided ;  how  this  river  depression  formed 
the  best  line  of  travel  and  offered  the  least  cost  in  con- 
struction. When  the  engineers  had  finished  their 
recital,  he  took  a  ruler  and  drew  a  straight  line  be- 
tween the  two  cities,  saying,  "  Build  it  by  that  route." 
Men  are  seeking  the  short-cut  in  the  fulfillment  of  their 
prayers.  They  do  not  see  at  first,  they  have  to  learn 
that  natural  law  and  human  temperament,  the  course 
of  history,  and  the  fitness  of  men  to  receive, — these 
must  enter  into  the  account.  Every  answer  to  prayer 
is  a  balance  of  forces.  When  the  church  prays  for  the 
kingdom  of  God  to  come,  it  would  be  foolish  indeed  to 
expect  a  sudden  conversion  of  mankind ;  the  sudden  up- 
rooting of  old  religious  habits  in  China,  where  they 
have  difficulty  enough  in  planting  the  simplest  ideas  of 
popular  government;  the  destruction  of  caste  in  India; 
the  crushing  of  lust  in  Turkey,  and  the  defeat  of  arrant 
selfishness  throughout  the  whole  earth.  Is  there  a 
definite  short-cut  to  that  goal?  If  men  think  that  it 
and  it  only  should  be  followed,  I  do  not  wonder 
at  their  despair.  What  else  could  you  expect,  in  view 
of  the  fact  that  Jesus  taught  that  His  kingdom  came  by 
quiet  growth  and  not  by  violence,  that  is,  by  the  explo- 
sion of  a  dynamite  charge? 

Nevertheless,  the  prayers  of  the  church  will  be 
answered.  The  imperial  word  of  the  Lord  is  set  to 
the  promise.  We  should  like  to  know  what  impression 
the  text  made  on  its  first  hearers.  If  you  had  sat  at  the 
table  that  evening  and  observed  the  despised  Master 
with  no  political  strength  and  no  religious  retinue, 
heard  His  statement  that  whatever  was  asked  in  His 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  133 

name  should  be  done,  would  incredulity  or  downright 
faith  in  face  of  contrary  facts  have  overtaken  your 
mind?  What  could  He  do  to  win  the  judgment  of  man- 
kind? What  power  had  He  to  issue  the  edicts  of 
heaven?  And  yet  His  promise  is:  "I  will  do  it; 
I  will  bring  the  prayer  to  its  proper  consummation 
and  make  the  petitioners  sure  that  they  have  not  mis- 
taken my  power."  How  ?  A  skeptical  world  has  asked 
it  ever  since.  How?  The  church  has  sought  for  ex- 
planation and  has  not  always  been  certain  of  her 
grounds.  But  there  the  promise  stands,  and  we  have 
not  the  least  doubt  that  it  has  been  verified  a  thousand, 
a  million  times  in  the  life  of  the  world.  Let  us  get 
the  divine  point  of  view. 

The  union  of  the  heart  of  the  disciple  with  his 
Lord's  is  the  first  token  of  success.  That  ancient 
adage,  "  One  with  God  is  a  majority,"  has  its  realiza- 
tion in  every  crucial  test  of  Christian  service.  On  no 
other  assumption  can  we  explain  the  serene  and  con- 
fident hope  of  many  a  troubled  heart.  Savonarola  goes 
to  the  stake  with  unblanched  face;  he  knows  his 
Lord's  ability  to  take  care  of  him.  Paton  seeks  the 
sodden  pagans  of  the  South  Sea,  expecting  nothing  but 
death,  cruel,  brutal  death  at  their  hands.  Prayer  stays 
him  in  every  emergency.  The  mind  of  the  worker  is 
one  with  the  mind  of  God.  Put  the  two  together,  and 
the  request  which  expresses  the  mind's  wish  will  be 
the  echo  of  the  Lord's  desire  for  the  world. 

Again,  this  united  purpose  is  a  spiritual,  not  worldly 
aim.  The  Jews  supposed  that  God  wished  for  them  a 
national  glory,  by  which  His  Name  might  be  honored 
among  the  nations.  Hence,  they  could  not  take  in 
the  spiritual  message  of  the  Galilean  Teacher.  The 
church  at  times  seems  bound  by  a  worldly  type  of 


134  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ambition,  as  though  the  dominance  of  politics  or  con- 
trol of  secular  education  might  best  inure  to  the  suc- 
cess of  the  divine  kingdom.  Jesus'  idea  was  other  than 
this.  The  church's  idea  can  only  prevail  when  the 
spiritual  tone  is  heard  in  every  part  of  her  service. 
.  It  is  our  business,  then,  to  pray  for  a  spiritual  change 
in  life.  We  shall  get  no  answer  in  anything  else. 
Let  us  dwell  on  this  in  our  closest  meditation. 

Finally,  we  remember  that  eternity,  not  time,  is  the 
field  of  operation.  The  masters  of  men  are  bothered 
by  the  specter  of  expiring  time.  Time  is  for  slaves,  not 
for  spirits.  We  are  amazed  at  the  infinitude  of  time 
required  to  develop  the  lion  from  its  primordial  germ. 
Nature  knows  nothing  of  the  narrowing  limits  of 
years.  Shall  nature's  Lord  suffer  His  plans  to  lapse, 
because  they  are  not  finished  when  the  year  ends? 
Take,  for  example,  that  recurring  problem  of  church 
unity.  The  prayer  is,  "  That  they  may  be  one,"  a  prayer 
made  by  the  Holy  Christ  Himself  just  before  He  suf- 
fered. Hardly  had  the  church  been  founded,  ere  dis- 
sensions broke  out,  and  they  have  continued  to  this 
day  and  shall  persist  so  long  as  the  church  remains  in 
her  visible  state.  But  must  the  prayer  be  cast  into 
the  limbo  of  wrecked  petitions?  Is  not  the  answer  be- 
ing already  framed?  When  we  remember  into  how 
many  discordant  divisions  Islam  and  Hinduism  and 
Buddhism  are  broken,  why  should  we  be  surprised  at 
the  few  that  dot  our  horizon?  Without  question  the 
feeling  for  betterment  is  even  now  rising.  Men  are 
asking  how  we  may  heal  the  breaches  and  form  in  the 
open  a  united  Christianity.  There  is  plenty  of  time 
for  unification ;  there  is  already  at  hand  a  deep  unity, 
deeper  than  government,  than  creed,  than  form  of 
worship ;  there  is  a  unity  of  faith ;  there  is  a  oneness  of 


THE  MAGIC  OF  A  NAME  135 

purpose;  there  is  a  sublime  abandon  of  common  love 
that  betokens  the  moving  of  God's  Spirit.  Let  us 
pray  in  the  Holy  Name  that  the  unity  may  be  ever  more 
plainly  realized. 

I  have  finished.  My  desire  is  to  exalt  the  Name 
which  is  above  every  name.  I  bid  you  to  repeat  its 
sacred  syllables,  to  use  it  in  your  prayers,  to  follow 
its  intent,  and  weave  its  ideals  into  your  life.  'Tis 
thus  that  you  reach  your  goal;  'tis  thus  that  you 
verify  the  promise.  Listen  to  a  simple  tale.  When 
Gilbert  ^  Becket  went  to  Palestine  as  a  crusader,  he 
fell  a  prisoner  into  the  hands  of  a  native  prince. 
Wretched,  alone,  in  a  foreign  land,  his  misery  was 
observed  by  the  lord's  daughter,  who  taught  him  some 
of  her  language  and  taught  him  also  the  mystery  of 
love.  Aided  by  her  ingenuity  he  made  good  his  escape, 
exacting  from  her  the  promise  that  she  would  follow 
him  to  England  and  enter  his  home  as  his  wife.  One 
phrase  only  she  learnt :  "  Becket,  London."  In  the 
course  of  time,  when  her  affection  could  no  longer  be 
restrained,  she  fled  by  night  and  took  passage  with  an 
English  merchantman,  which  brought  her  to  the  shores 
of  Britain,  the  country  of  her  beloved.  Once  on  land 
at  Dover  she  started  for  the  city,  her  only  direction 
being,  "  London,  h,  Becket."  Slowly,  with  pain,  she 
struggled  on,  till  she  stood  at  the  city's  gates.  Her 
Oriental  dress  and  strange  tongue  elicited  now  the 
jeers,  now  the  pity  of  the  multitude,  and  with  the 
curious  feeling  native  to  no  clime  they  accompanied 
her  till  at  their  bidding  she  stood  before  his  house.  She 
knocked,  she  called,  she  waited.  Could  he  be  there? 
would  he  hear  her  voice?  was  the  love  as  deep,  as  de- 
cisive, as  when  they  parted  by  the  Syrian  shore?  A 
step  was  heard,  a  bounding  step;  the  accents  of  the 


136  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

beloved  voice  had  penetrated  to  the  rooms  within.  He 
heard,  he  recognized,  he  ran,  he  embraced  her.  They 
entered,  and  the  door  was  shut. 

This  was  the  mother  of  Thomas  h  Becket,  who  by  the 
recitation  of  a  name  won  her  heart's  desire. 


IX 

THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY 


John  H:16,  17.  "He  shall  give  you 
another  Comforter  .  .  .  even  the  Spirit  of 
truth." 


THE  doctrine  of  the  Holy  Spirit  belongs  to  the 
New  Testament  revelation.  It  is  foreshadowed 
in  a  dim  and  meager  way  at  creation;  in  the 
transactions  of  the  prophets  it  is  faintly  apprehended. 
The  divine  Spirit  could  not  be  really  known  until  the 
divine  Son  had  done  His  work.  Then  the  acquaintance 
began.  Christian  thought  has  dwelt  with  amazing  ea- 
gerness on  the  theme.  Who  is  this  Spirit?  What  re- 
lation does  He  bear  to  the  supreme  Father?  Whence 
does  He  come,  and  by  what  path?  Does  He  proceed 
from  the  Father  singly  or  from  both  Father  and  Son? 
What  is  the  nature  of  His  office,  and  how  many  gifts 
does  He  impart  to  men?  These  are  questions  that 
have  enthralled  and  sometimes  cursed  the  church. 
Great  cleavages  have  been  wrought  into  the  fabric  of 
truth  by  different  attitudes  towards  the  doctrine.  To- 
day, two  churches  each  purporting  to  possess  the  true 
revelation  stand  apart,  because  of  one  Latin  word. 
And  yet,  with  it  all  the  believing  heart  has  found  in 
the  doctrine  its  highest  support.  We  cannot  give  up 
the  secret  ministry  of  grace.  We  accept  at  face  value 
the  prayer  of  Jesus  that  God  would  bestow  another 
Comforter,  whose  residence  on  earth  was  to  be  per- 
manent. 

137 


138  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Let  us  think  on  the  character  and  the  work  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  as  embodied  in  this  verse. 


Our  imagination  is  at  once  fixed  by  the  name  which 
the  Lord  assigns,  the  Comforter,  or  as  better  trans- 
lated, the  Advocate.  It  would  be  diflScult  to  measure 
the  influence  of  this  word  on  the  affections  of  the 
church.  Men  in  deep  trouble  have  found  in  its  syl- 
lables the  accents  of  hope.  Saints  on  the  wings  of 
joy  borne  aloft  by  a  mystic  experience  have  felt  the 
inward  thrill  of  strength.  Workers  amid  the  clamors 
of  service  have  sought  help,  sought  wisdom,  sought 
refreshing  stimulus  from  its  familiar  tones.  We  would 
not  rob  the  word  of  its  historic  meaning;  we  dare  not 
separate  the  church  from  her  age-long  faith.  It  seems 
almost  like  sacrilege  to  suggest  a  change  in  translation. 
So  intimately  are  these  letters  entwined  with  the 
heart-strings  of  love,  that  the  most  exact  revisers  have 
not  ventured  to  substitute  the  better  term,  lest  some 
humble  trust  should  be  imperiled.  The  word  has  been 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  since  the  time  of  Wickliffe,  and  a 
holy  reverence  has  gathered  about  it.  But  the  idea  in 
the  English  word  has  changed.  Then  it  meant  '^  to 
impart  strength "  ;  now  it  means  to  visit  sympathy 
upon  another.  Then  it  was  fairly  near  the  meaning  of 
the  Evangelist;  now  it  shares  only  one  of  the  subsid- 
iary meanings.  The  primary  picture  of  the  word  has 
been  lost  in  translation,  and  I  intend  to  restore  it. 
John,  the  writer,  was  close  to  the  nomenclature  of  his 
day.  He  understood  what  Jesus  said  in  the  private 
discourse  of  the  upper  room,  and  he  knew,  too,  how  to 
embody  that  thought  in  the  sacred  language  of  the 
church.    Moreover,  in  his  first  letter  he  used  the  very 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  139 

word  as  referring  to  Christ,  and  translators  are  unani- 
mous in  rendering  it  by  the  word  which  we  propose 
for  our  text. 

"  Paraclete  "  was  a  term  in  ancient  law  equivalent  j 
to  our  modern  solicitor  or  attorney.  He  was  an  ■ 
officer  in  court  whose  plea  was  usually  on  the  side  of 
the  defendant.  The  distinguished  orator  at  Athens  has 
left  on  record  a  study  of  the  immense  personal  influ- 
ence enjoyed  by  public  pleaders.  They  always  appeal 
to  the  fancy  of  the  people,  because  they  stand  at  times 
between  the  innocent  and  an  unjust  sentence.  Famous 
in  annals  of  legal  procedure  is  the  oration  of  Cicero  ' 
on  behalf  of  Archias,  which  all  schoolboys  love  to  | 
read  (because  it  is  so  easy) .  The  Greek  poet  is  accused 
of  securing  his  citizenship  by  illegal  means.  Cicero 
rises  to  his  defense.  The  plea  is  not  simply  a  personal 
one;  it  is  a  challenge  to  the  state  to  recognize  the  value 
of  letters,  the  luster  of  literary  names,  and  the  incen- 
tive of  true  fame  as  a  motive  for  right  living.  It  is  as 
an  advocate,  a  paraclete,  that  Cicero  lifts  his  voice  in 
the  Roman  senate  and  pleads  for  justice.  The  term 
passed  into  common  speech,  and  even  into  the  language 
of  religious  philosophy.  For  example,  Philo  seizes 
upon  it  to  express  his  idea  of  a  mediator  through  whom 
the  Father  of  the  Universe  imparts  His  abundant  bless- 
ings to  mankind ;  and  the  Jewish  professors  taking  over 
the  very  word  declare  that  mercy  and  righteousness  are 
a  soul's  best  advocate  in  heaven. 

The  Holy  Spirit,  then,  is  called  an  attorney  for  the 
believer.  Would  that  the  men  of  courts  and  law  who 
have  a  right  to  this  official  name  might  realize  the  sol- 
emn significance  attaching  to  it!  Let  us  see  how 
clearly  the  character  of  the  attorney  is  repeated  on  an 
infinite  scale  in  the  Person  of  the  Paraclete. 


140  JOHN  FOURTEEN* 

First,  the  legal  adviser  is  acquainted  with  law.  He 
must  be  or  he  cannot  be  recorded  as  a  member  of  the 
bar.  Law  for  him  is  the  settled  system  of  social  order 
guaranteed  and  enforced  by  the  state.  It  is  registered 
in  custom,  constitution,  or  statute.  It  is  his  business 
to  interpret  the  law  in  respect  of  individual  persons 
and  single  events.  He  must  know  what  law  applies  to 
his  client's  case  and  how  to  put  the  case  before  the 
judge  so  as  to  get  most  favorable  returns.  The  parallel 
is  precise.  Christ  calls  the  divine  Spirit  the  "  Spirit 
of  truth."  He  comes  into  human  hearts  with  a  perfect 
knowledge  of  justice  and  a  profuse  endowment  of  love. 
His  treatment  of  sin  and  foible  is  not  partial.  Justice 
fails  ofttimes  in  civil  courts,  whether  for  want  of  in- 
sight or  because  of  prepossession.  No  soul  gets  more 
or  less  than  its  share  of  attention  from  the  divine 
Attorney.  No  ^case  is  misrepresented.  You  do  not  find 
an  extravagant  and  expensive  defense  for  pampered 
interests  and  a  lame,  half-hearted  trial  when  a  poor 
man  has  to  pay  the  bill.  Truth  is  the  watchword  of  the 
holy  Paraclete,  divine  truth  handled  by  a  divine  Mind. 
God  brings  to  bear  the  sweep  of  His  infallible  judgment 
on  the  case  of  a  troubled  soul. 

Again,  the  Advocate  is,  as  his  name  shows,  one 
called  to  the  side  of  the  defendant.  It  is  a  voluntary 
relation.  In  some  countries  the  accused  may  plead 
his  own  cause,  may  state  what  the  facts  are  in  his 
opinion,  what  rights  he  acted  on  in  his  conduct  which 
is  now  called  in  question,  and  what  he  thinks  should  be 
the  decision.  On  the  other  hand,  he  may  be  represented 
by  counsel.  If  so,  the  engagement  is  at  his  own  in- 
stance ;  he  must  take  the  first  step.  I  find  an  illustra- 
tion here  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  human  soul.  We 
have  been  plagued  with  a  set  of  theological  ideas  that 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  141 

corrupt  the  will  and  dethrone  our  manhood.  The  pur- 
pose has  been  to  lift  up  the  scepter  of  divine  power ;  the 
issue  has  been  to  cast  suspicion  on  the  noblest  creation 
of  God's  hand.  A  man  can  decide  his  own  destiny; 
a  man  must  decide  it.  If  you  are  willing  to  throw 
away  your  personal  power  and  just  drift  on  the  uneven 
seas  of  providential  regard,  you  may  do  so.  I  will  not. 
But  with  all  my  determination  of  will  I  am  aware  that 
I  cannot  reach  the  harbor  of  perfect  truth  without  some 
help.  I  seek  for  advice.  I  search  my  own  heart  and 
find  a  plentitude  of  purpose  but  no  force  at  hand  to 
turn  it  into  fact.  I  search  the  Book  of  inspiration  and  / 
make  a  profound  discovery.  There  is  a  Power,  not  myi 
own,  which  transmutes  purpose  into  performance.  I 
appeal  to  this  Power;  I  engage  Him  as  my  counselor. 
In  the  gigantic  struggle  against  evil  I  put  my  case  in 
His  hands.  Just  as  the  man  who  stands  indicted  on  a 
serious  charge  I  pass  over  all  papers,  facts,  hopes,  and 
fears  to  Him ;  I  rest  myself  on  His  activity.  He  repre- 
sents me  before  the  bar  of  an  accusing  world.  I  believe 
this  to  be  what  Jesus  meant  by  the  glorious  title  which 
He  ascribed  to  the  Spirit  of  truth. 

But  we  have  not  finished.  The  attorney  becomes 
responsible  for  the  conduct  of  the  case  and  the  ver- 
dict. His  client  depends  on  his  skill  in  arguing  the 
matter  before  judge  or  jury,  selecting  the  right  points 
for  emphasis,  adducing  the  right  points  in  law,  touch- 
ing the  temperamental  eccentricities  of  the  court,  and 
if  the  case  be  one  of  flagrant  injustice  rebuking  with 
scathing  words  the  men  or  forces  that  brought  the 
action.  This  is  the  duty  of  the  attorney,  and  this 
duty  the  divine  Advocate  has  assumed.  We  do  not  de- 
tract from  His  dignity  by  such  a  symbol ;  nay,  we  exalt 
it.    The  believer  is  frequently  unable  to  defend  him- 


142  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

self  personally  against  the  taunts  of  worldly  men.  In- 
deed, the  time  will  come  to  each  of  us  as  it  came  to 
John  the  Baptist,  to  Luther  and  Knox,  when  we  shall 
not  be  able  to  tell  whether  we  are  in  the  wrong  or  not ; 
when  we  shall  begin  to  accuse  ourselves  in  line  with 
the  accusation  of  a  vengeful  world.  Then  the  divine 
Attorney  steps  to  the  bar  and  pleads  for  us.  Then  we 
note  the  fire  in  His  words  and  the  superlative  eloquence 
of  His  tones.  It  is  not  for  nought  that  He  has  accepted 
our  retainer.  He  will  fight  for  us,  that  is,  for  the  spark 
of  truth  and  honor  and  right  in  our  souls.  He  will 
take  the  wavering  John  Huss  and  plant  the  seeds  of 
eternal  courage  in  his  soul.  Let  fires  burn  and  stakes 
be  made  erect;  what  cares  the  valiant  heart  for  whom 
the  Holy  Solicitor  has  pled?  You  may  rack  the  body 
with  Inquisitorial  cruelty  or  dance  the  soul  over  the 
steaming  pit  of  hell;  we  have  no  fear,  so  long  as  our 
Counselor  holds  in  His  hand  an  infallible  brief  and 
defends  us  against  a  malignant  foe. 

Take  still  another  fact.  The  lawyer  is  entitled  to 
his  fees.  He  is  about  the  only  citizen  who  is  sure  of 
his  compensation  beyond  a  doubt.  It  may  be  involved 
in  the  rendering  of  a  judgment  for  damages;  and  that 
judgment  cannot  be  passed  out  of  the  court's  hands 
until  the  defending  attorney  has  received  his  share. 
Let  us  not  deal  lightly  with  the  suggestion.  The  par- 
allel is  again  exact.  I  delight  in  the  truth  it  covers. 
The  Holy  Spirit  will  not  fail  to  collect  His  compensa- 
tion. If  God  gives  you  redemption  through  His  Son, 
if  He  develops  the  powers  of  mind  and  spirit,  if  He 
guarantees  you  a  place  in  the  world  to  come,  are  you 
to  furnish  nothing  in  return?  I  honor  the  heroic  ab- 
negation of  the  young  Edinburgh  student  who  faced 
death  as  the  result  of  a  sudden  accident.    Urged  to 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  143 

make  ready  for  the  great  change,  he  cried  out :  "  I  have 
lived  all  my  life  for  my  own  pleasure ;  and  shall  I  give 
the  dregs  of  it  to  God  ?  "  I  ask  you,  my  friends,  can  you 
accept  the  unstinted  mercies  of  heaven,  the  sunshine, 
the  thrill  of  health,  the  joys  of  friendship,  the  peace  of 
forgiven  sin,  and  then  do  nothing  to  show  your  grati- 
tude? No,  the  Solicitor's  fee  must  be  paid.  I  leave  it 
to  you  to  say  how  it  shall  be  met.  Paul  had  no  hesita- 
tion in  assessing  the  costs  and  paying  them.  "  Ye  shall 
live,"  he  exclaims,  "  if  ye  through  the  Spirit  do  mortify 
the  deeds  of  the  body."  A  blanket  fee  indeed,  the  most 
sweeping  we  can  make.  It  means  the  putting  away  of 
the  vanities,  the  pleasures,  the  excesses  of  bodily  indul- 
gence. It  means  that  you  cannot  wear  fine  clothes  just 
for  the  sake  of  exhibiting  them,  or  play  your  games 
just  for  the  sake  of  having  a  little  fun,  or  winning  the 
stakes;  or  tip  the  glass  just  for  the  sake  of  getting  a 
momentary  exhilaration.  It  means  that  if  the  Spirit 
has  defended  you  before  an  unfriendly  world,  you  are 
expected  to  champion  His  maxims  in  the  face  of  a 
social  sneer  or  even  in  front  of  an  uplifted  sword.  That 
is  Paul's  way  of  meeting  an  honorable  obligation,  and 
I  can  assure  you,  nothing  but  it  will  gain  for  you  the 
commendation  of  a  divine  Lord. 


II 

We  return  to  the  assertion  of  the  text,  "He  shall 
give  you  another  Comforter."  Let  us  now  stress  the 
word  "  another."  It  opens  a  new  avenue  of  inquiry. 
The  divine  Attorney  does  not  stand  alone;  He  is  in- 
dissolubly  associated  with  a  Precursor.  It  was  said  of 
John  that  he  came  in  the  spirit  of  Elijah,  with  a  rugged 
message  to  an  age  of  religious  Indolence  and  with  a 


144.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

fearless  advocacy  of  right.  It  is  now  said  that  when 
the  Paraclete  comes,  he  shall  be  another  Christ.  The 
value  of  the  thought  to  Christian  theology  is  clear ;  we 
can  determine  just  what  kind  of  a  Person  the  Holy 
Spirit  is.  We  have  thus  far  studied  Him  theoretically ; 
we  are  now  at  liberty  to  ascribe  to  Him  definite  traits, 
moral  traits,  I  mean,  personal  characteristics  that  come 
first  to  view  when  you  attempt  to  write  the  story  of  a 
life.  The  manner  of  emulation  must  be  observed.  It  is 
not  the  action  of  a  mere  copyist;  nor  is  it  the  uncon- 
scious replication  of  another's  mannerisms,  which 
forms  the  conspicuous  lines  of  so  many  careers.  It  is 
subject  to  proof  that  notable  men  leave  behind  them  a 
number  of  kindred  spirits,  who  have  insensibly  wrought 
in  the  same  fashion.  It  is  an  open  secret  that  John 
Marshall's  method  of  interpreting  law  has  been  fol- 
lowed by  the  greatest  legal  minds  since  his  day.  It  is 
conceded  that  Webster's  treatment  of  legal  questions, 
his  grand  oratorical  style,  his  personal  presence  exerted 
an  inescapable  charm  over  the  less  brilliant  men  of  his 
profession.  Imitation  is  one  of  the  deep-seated,  en- 
fibered  passions  of  the  human  heart. 

But  the  divine  Spirit  is  not  "  another  Comforter " 
in  the  sense  that  He  copies  the  style  of  Christ.  He 
does  not,  so  to  speak,  sit  down  before  the  life  of 
the  holy  Jesus,  as  a  student  sits  before  the  canvas  of 
an  old  master,  and  reproduce  one  by  one  the  acts  of  the 
Lord  in  His  "  training  of  the  twelve."  The  Holy  Spirit 
is  not  another  Person  in  that  sense.  He  is  not  set  off 
from  the  Other  in  the  same  way  that  two  men  are.  A 
son  may  be  extremely  like  his  father  in  look,  carriage, 
speech,  and  mode  of  thought.  Yet  they  remain  forever 
two  distinct  personalities.  The  divine  Spirit  and  the 
divine  Son  are  so  related  that  both  work  together,  and 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  145 

you  cannot  in  their  work  discover  which  is  preponder- 
atingly  to  the  front.  It  is  useless  to  frame  dogmas  that 
affirm  the  utter  separateness  of  the  Persons  of  the  God- 
head. They  break  down  at  the  words  of  Jesus  in  this 
Chapter : — "  I  will  not  leave  you  comfortless,  I  will  come 
to  you  " ;  "  the  Comforter,  whom  the  Father  will  send 
in  my  name,"  that  is,  bearing  my  power  and  conveying 
my  thought.  The  meaning  certainly  is  this: — Christ 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  are  two  expressions  of  the  same 
power,  each  one  an  Alter  Ego  to  the  other.  When  you 
talk  with  the  Spirit,  you  talk  with  Christ;  and  when 
you  talk  with  Christ,  you  talk  with  God.  The  series 
returns  on  itself,  and  we  find  the  unit  God  whom  we 
are  bound  to  worship  and  to  love. 

This  being  true,  the  action  of  the  Paraclete  may  be 
illustrated  by  the  service  of  Jesus.  Did  the  Lord  ever 
reveal  Himself  as  an  Attorney  for  His  friends  ?  Let  us 
turn  to  the  Gospels  for  our  information.  No  intelli- 
gent reader  can  accuse  Jesus  of  being  a  partisan.  He 
fulfilled  the  true  duty  of  solicitor  by  caring  for  His 
client's  interests.  He  defended  the  men  of  His  com- 
pany from  the  implied  slander  of  the  Pharisees.  They 
said,  "  Why  do  these  disloyal  Galileans  violate  the  com- 
mon law  of  Judaism  by  plucking  ears  of  corn  on  the 
Sabbath?  Are  they  not  aware  that  this  is  a  form 
of  work,  and  all  work  is  forbidden  on  the  holy  day?" 
The  charge  was  a  mere  quibble  and  sprang  from  the 
empty  formalism  of  the  day.  Jesus  took  up  the  defense 
in  short  order  and  taught  the  self-righteous  critics  a 
salutary  lesson.  What  can  be  holy  save  that  which 
God  has  sanctified?  Days,  years,  persons,  objects  get 
their  color  only  from  the  ideas  you  inject  into  them. 
Obey  the  spirit  of  the  law,  and  the  letter  will  take  care 
of  itself.    Thus  Jesus  defended  His  friends,  and  thus 


146  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  divine  Spirit  has  been  challenging  ever  since  the 
complacent  devotees  of  form,  as  against  the  quiet  souls 
who  walk  in  the  light  of  eternal  truth. 

Next,  Jesus  defended  His  friends  from  the  depres- 
sion of  their  own  minds.  I  have  said  that  the  true 
heart  more  than  once  falls  a  victim  to  the  delusion 
that  perhaps  the  world's  judgment  is  right,  and  ours 
is  wrong.  Look  at  the  moment  in  Jesus'  ministry, 
when  the  crowds  began  to  turn  their  backs  on  Him. 
It  was  a  moment  instinct  with  crisis.  The  men  at  His 
side  were  on  the  point  of  wavering.  You  cannot  blame 
them.  The  ruling  class  had  already  pronounced  against 
Him;  their  own  minds  were  not  satisfied  with  His 
Messianic  credentials.  And  yet  to  whom  could  they 
,  go,  if  they  abandoned  Him?  He  seemed  to  have  the 
i  words  of  life,  and  this  was  the  end  of  their  quest.  It 
was  then  that  the  Lord  defended  them  against  their 
own  hesitation,  defended  them  by  a  patient,  loving 
companionship,  worked  over  them,  not  by  argument, 
not  by  repeated  appeal,  just  let  them  breathe  again  the 
free  breath  of  His  own  profound  fellowship,  just  let 
them  have  a  second  glimpse  of  His  acquaintance  with 
God.  It  is  thus  the  sacred  Comforter  deals  with  us; 
deals  with  us  patiently,  quietly,  as  a  father  with  his 
wayward  boy. 

We  cannot  always  detect  the  subtle  plea  He  makes. 
We  sometimes  think  ourselves  alone  when  we  are 
enveloped  with  saving  grace.  I  remember  the  case  of  a 
distinguished  minister  whose  boy  had  grown  restive 
under  the  parental  roof.  He  longed  for  the  street,  for 
the  freedom  of  other  company,  where  men  let  go  the 
profane  word  when  they  pleased,  or  indulged  in  the 
deed  of  passion,  if  the  whim  took  them.  One  day 
he  left  his  home  with  a  furtive  look  but  a  high  hope ;  he 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  14.7 

would  see  the  world  for  himself.  Whither  he  should 
go,  he  had  not  the  slightest  idea.  He  started  out  alone, 
unseen,  as  he  supposed.  But  the  watchful  eye  of  his 
father  saw  him,  and  a  cautious  step  pursued.  For 
hours  he  tramped  alone  on  the  thoroughfares  of  that 
great  city, — till  night  came  on.  Then  the  step  grew 
slower  and  shoulders  were  bowed.  An  occasional  moan 
escaped  his  lips.  This  his  father  could  hear,  for  he 
had  drawn  near  in  the  darkness.  At  last  the  boy 
stopped,  and  sobs  shook  his  frame;  alone,  alone,  away 
from  the  home  he  loved.  Why  did  he  ever  wish  to  be 
free  from  the  gentle  restraint  of  loving  parents?  His 
mother — how  dear  she  became,  now  many  miles  away; 
his  father,  whose  firm  words  he  had  resented, — would 
he  not  gladly  sit  again  at  his  knee  and  listen  to  his 
counsel  ?  What  should  he  do,  where  should  he  go  ?  He 
was  in  despair.  Just  then,  the  kindly  hand  is  on  his 
shoulder,  and  the  beloved  arm  about  him,  and  into  his 
ears  the  father  almost  broken-hearted  pours  a  stream 
of  precious  words,  not  made  for  your  hearing,  or  mine. 
And  there  they  two,  father  and  son,  in  the  gathered 
dusk  kneel  and  pray,  plight  the  new  and  holier  troth 
that  together  they  will  do  the  will  of  God. 

My  friend,  the  Comforter,  gentle  Solicitor  to  the 
soul,  pours  into  your  ears  the  story  of  a  mightier  love, 
against  which  you  have  fought,  to  which  you  may  now 
submit  with  a  heart's  obeisance. 


Ill 

I  have  detailed  the  official  character  of  the  Spirit  of 
truth,  the  divine  Attorney,  and  His  likeness  to  the 
Lord  of  glory.  It  remains  now  to  set  forth  His  meth- 
ods of  work.    Where  does  He  hold  court?    Is  it  His 


148  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

duty  to  appear  before  God  and  champion  the  cause 
of  the  saints?  Or  does  He  meet  the  attacks  of  evil- 
minded  men  and  rebuke  them  in  the  court  of  the  world? 
Dr.  Westcott,  the  able  expounder  of  this  Gospel,  adopts 
the  latter,  and  I  am  glad  to  agree  with  him.  It  is  as 
though  a  battle  royal  were  pitched,  a  legal  tourney,  on 
the  one  side  the  great  Accuser,  whom  John  saw  in  the 
last  Assize,  and  on  the  other,  the  Christian's  friend 
whom  Jesus  named  the  "  Advocate."  Let  us  enter 
the  somber  chambers  where  the  debate  is  continually 
in  progress. 

I  think  we  shall  hear  first  the  charge  that  the  church 
'  is  an  utter  failure.  The  charge  will  be  made  specific. 
It  will  state  that  never  in  all  its  long  and  strenuous 
history  has  the  church  succeeded  in  constructing  a 
single  perfect  character.  It  will  affirm  that  the  type 
of  doctrine  has  never  been  perfectly  consistent;  that 
throughout  the  wide  spaces  of  Christendom  there  is  not 
one  dogma  that  commands  the  assent  and  devout 
loyalty  of  the  entire  church.  It  will  point  out  the 
divisions  in  the  body  of  Christ,  the  bitter  contentions, 
the  religious  wars,  the  bloody  arenas,  where  deeds  of 
violence  have  been  foully  done,  the  persecutions  insti- 
tuted by  one  group  of  disciples  against  another,  the 
unseemly  rivalry  today  as  between  supposed  brethren, 
and  the  trivial  differences  that  separate  men  bearing 
the  same  Name  and  honoring  the  same  Lord.  It  will 
set  forth  the  apparent  inadequacy  of  the  church  to 
stem  the  tide  of  commercialism  or  allay  the  threats 
of  war;  the  slow  and  unequal  battle  it  is  waging  with 
the  errors  of  heathenism ;  the  greater  fidelity  and  more 
aggressive  campaign  conducted  at  this  moment  by  the 
Mohammedan  hosts;  the  general  impracticableness  of 
its  ideals,  and  withal  the  growing  indifference,  so  it 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  149 

says,  within  the  ranks  of  the  church  to  the  really 
spiritual  purpose  of  religion.  The  charge  is  a  serious 
one ;  it  is  flanked  by  facts  that  we  may  not  blink  even 
though  they  can  be  readily  explained.  It  is  urged  by 
men  and  movements,  by  institutions  and  opposing  re- 
ligions. Dark  days  fall  upon  the  heart  of  the  church, 
and  some  of  its  warmest  champions  begin  to  feel,  we 
ought  not  to  be  so  certain  in  our  conviction  that 
Christ  will  conquer  the  world. 

It  is  then  that  the  Spokesman  for  the  church  arises. 
It  is  then  that  a  new,  a  searching  Voice  is  heard  in 
the  halls  of  the  world's  debate.  It  is  then  that  the 
answer  preparing  from  eternity  rolls  through  the  cor- 
ridors of  time.  The  divine  Attorney  speaks.  The 
enemies  of  the  truth  are  hushed  to  silence.  Not  with 
shafts  of  magic,  not  with  Jove's  mythic  blade  of  flame, 
not  with  torrents  of  argument,  not  with  the  downfall 
of  cherished  institutions — not  by  might,  nor  by  power, 
but  by  the  Spirit,  by  the  marvel  of  grace,  is  the  word 
of  heaven  recorded.  On  Pentecost  the  Champion  of  i 
truth  spoke  His  word,  and  three  thousand  sinners  fell. 
In  the  dull  and  leaden  atmosphere  of  the  Middle 
Ages  the  voice  again  was  heard,  and  nations  hastened 
to  be  born  under  the  revolutionary  doctrine  of  faith./ 
England  steeped  her  mind  in  the  dialetics  of  Deism; 
natural  passions  ran  unchecked  through  her  lanes 
and  streets;  glorious  cathedrals  were  only  training- 
grounds  for  man-made  morality;  till  one  day  John 
Wesley  lifted  the  standard  of  grace,  and  soon  like  a 
glowing  tide  the  theme  of  Free  Salvation  swept  into 
city  and  town,  and  over  the  seas  to  this  Western  clime, 
and  the  answer  to  infidelity  was  complete.  If  you  wish 
to  see  what  crushed,  ground  into  powder,  extinguished 
Tom  Paine  and  his  atheistic  creed,  look  into  the  seeth- 


150  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ing  meeting-house  of  the  period,  and  behold  the 
stricken  sinners  crying  for  the  breath  of  liberty.  The 
rebuke  of  the  divine  Attorney  is  always  in  the  way  of 
a  burst  of  spiritual  grace,  a  flood  of  conviction.  If 
you  think,  we  need  today  some  new  answer  to  the 
perennial  charge,  get  down  on  your  knees  and  call 
aloud  for  help.  Call  aloud,  call  with  energy,  call  in- 
sistently, and  then  go  to  work  and  realize  the  terms 
of  your  prayer! 

I  think,  we  shall  hear  the  charge  made,  too,  that  the 
church  is  not  able  to  express  the  underlying  ideas  of 
her  faith.  That  charge  has  often  been  made.  It  is 
made  at  this  moment.  We  are  asked,  why  Christian 
men  and  women  are  silent  in  regard  to  their  cardinal 
hopes,  sepulchrally,  dismally  silent,  when  persons  with 
temporal  schemes  only  move  heaven  and  earth  to  pub- 
lish abroad  their  peculiar  views.  What  would  it  mean 
to  the  church  now  if  a  tenth  part  of  the  social  mag- 
netism wrapped  up  in  certain  groups  were  injected  into 
the  membership  of  Christian  bodies?  The  men  who 
call  themselves  Socialists  are  eaten  up  with  zeal;  they 
talk  their  opinions,  they  herald  the  new  panaceas  over 
the  whole  country,  they  rest  not  day  nor  night  like  the 
angels  in  heaven.  Why  should  the  disciples  of  Jesus 
shrink  from  disclosing  their  doctrines?  It  must  be, 
either  because  the  doctrines  are  worthless,  or — which  is 
just  as  bad — because  those  doctrines  have  failed  to 
make  any  impression  on  their  minds.  Such  is  the 
accusation,  laid  against  us  in  the  court  of  the  world's 
opinion.  It  is  not  new;  it  has  borne  the  brunt  of  at- 
tack for  nearly  two  millenniums.  It  has  been  exposed, 
perforated,  reduced  to  splinters  again  and  again;  yet 
it  is  pieced  together  for  further  use.  It  was  answered 
by  Jesus  in  advance,  when  He  said  that  no  disciple 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  151 

needed  to  write  his  brief;  for  the  Spirit  would  tell 
him  in  the  hour  of  persecution  what  he  ought  to  say. 
It  was  answered  in  Jerusalem,  when  Peter,  a  common 
fisherman,  with  no  training  under  Gamaliel,  utterly 
estranged  from  the  rhetorical  arts  of  the  day,  stood  up 
before  the  assembled  multitude  and  flung  the  winged 
word  of  conviction  into  the  cringing  heart  of  Jew  and 
Gentile.  It  had  a  superb  rebuttal  in  the  career  of  the 
Apostle  Paul.  Here  was  a  man  endowed  with  every 
art  of  public  persuasion.  He  could  state  and  prove 
the  proposition  against  the  infant  church.  He  did  so 
in  every  synagogue  at  Jerusalem  and  was  about  to 
carry  the  war  into  Damascus  when  the  infallible 
Attorney  stood  up  to  plead.  That  mighty  argument  is 
registered  in  the  Sixth  and  Seventh  of  Romans;  you 
may  read  it  for  yourself.  The  argument  is  long  and 
very  intricate,  befitting  the  appeal  to  the  learned  mind 
of  Paul.  The  argument  was  also  effective;  for  when 
the  sun's  zenith  was  reached  outside  the  Damascene 
walls,  Saul  of  Tarsus  gave  up  the  case  and  accepted  the 
rebuttal  as  a  fact.  If  a  critic  insist  that  we  have  dealt 
only  with  exceptions,  only  with  men  of  extraordinary 
power,  such  as  genius  confers  on  a  few,  let  him,  I  say, 
study  the  instance  before  his  eyes, — a  man,  steeped  in 
the  selfishness  of  business,  a  woman  lured  by  the  en- 
ticing call  of  pleasure,  met,  gripped,  taught,  empowered 
by  the  inward  Grace;  a  man,  a  woman,  startled  into 
speech,  forgetting  the  gauds  and  mockeries  of  the  world, 
standing  forth  to  preach  Christ, — what  is  this  but  the 
Spirit's  challenge  to  a  carping  world  that  we  have 
in  our  day,  too,  a  warmth  of  feeling,  a  prophet's  desire 
to  plead  for  the  verities  of  the  faith?  Is  it  the  prod- 
uct of  an  overwrought  imagination?  Is  it  the  sign  of 
some  social  unrest?    Is  it  a  mere  revulsion  of  feeling 


152  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

away  from  current  indifference  to  religious  concerns? 
I  care  not  how  the  man  of  science  may  explain  it.  I 
know  how  God  has  brought  it  forth.  I  know  that  it 
conforms  to  His  promise,  made  in  the  days  of  Joel  the 
prophet : 

"And  it  shall  come  to  pass  in  the  last  days,  saith  God,  I  will 
pour  out  of  my  Spirit  on  all  flesh;  and  your  sons  and  your 
daughters  shall  prophesy,  and  your  young  men  shall  see  visions, 
and  your  old  men  shall  dream  dreams." 

The  fact  of  the  case  is  this :  when  the  divine  Advocate 
utters  His  word,  He  speaks  by  the  voice  of  His  humble 
servants.  The  voice  of  fearlessness,  the  note  of  triumph 
heard  now  and  again  in  the  court  of  the  world's  debate 
are  not  human  but  divine.  Mere  man  cannot  speak 
with  the  accents  of  authority;  he  commands  attention 
only  under  the  spell  of  a  great  inspiration.  And  that 
is  the  Spirit  pleading  the  cause  of  Truth  through  his 
lips. 

A  little  over  a  hundred  years  ago,  the  heart  of  Ire- 
land bled  for  its  slaughtered  hero.  Robert  Emmet, 
brave  in  war,  astute  in  counsel,  was  executed  on  the 
charge  of  treason.  The  charge  was  proven,  for  h^ 
had  led  the  conspiracy,  which  was  to  release  his  native 
land  from  the  domination  of  Great  Britain.  Goaded 
by  love  he  returned  from  the  mountain  fastness  to  re- 
visit his  betrothed,  when  he  was  captured  and  brought 
to  perfunctory  trial.  He  appeared  as  his  own  advocate, 
and  pleaded  his  own  cause  in  language  so  pure  and 
eloquent  that  few  speeches  in  criminal  practice  can  be 
compared  to  his. 

"  My  Lords: — What  have  I  to  say  why  sentence  of  death  should 
not  be  pronounced  against  me  according  to  law?  I  have  nothing 
to  say  that  can  alter  your  predetermination. 

But  I  have  much  to  say  why  my  reputation  should  be  rescued 


THE  DIVINE  ATTORNEY  153 

from  the  load  of  false  accusation  and  calumny  which  has  been 
heaped  upon  it.  The  sentence  of  the  law,  which  delivers  my  body 
to  the  executioner,  will  labor  in  its  own  vindication,  to  consign 
my  character  to  obloquy;  for  there  must  be  guilt  somewhere — 
whether  in  the  sentence  of  the  court,  or  in  the  catastrophe,  pos- 
terity must  determine.  I  have  but  one  request  to  ask  at  my  de- 
parture from  this  world;  it  is  the  charity  of  silence.  Let  no  one 
write  my  epitaph ;  for,  as  no  one  who  knows  my  motives  dare  now 
vindicate  them,  let  no  prejudice  or  ignorance  asperse  them.  Let 
them  and  me  repose  in  obscurity  and  peace,  and  my  tomb  remain 
uninscribed,  until  other  times  and  other  men  can  do  justice  to  my 
character.  When  my  country  shall  take  her  place  among  the 
nations  of  the  earth,  then,  and  not  till  then,  let  my  epitaph  be 
written." 

Not  Robert  Emmet,  but  the  spirit  of  Irish  Freedom, 
spoke  in  these  noble  sentences.  Apart  from  love  of 
country  such  words,  such  deeds  could  not  have  been 
produced. 

In  that  higher  inspiration  when  men  catch  the 
fire  of  God  and  truth  is  the  shining  steel  of  victory, 
whatever  men  speak,  whatever  men  do  shall  be  the 
Spirit's  witness  to  undying  faith,  and  the  test  of  truth 
will  be  men's  unflinching  obedience  to  the  heavenly 
call. 


THE  INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD 
FOR  SPIRITUAL  TRUTH 

John  14 :17.  "  The  Spirit  of  truth,  whom 
the  world  cannot  receive;  because  it  seeth 
him  not,  neither  knoweth  him." 

TRUTH  is  the  object  of  imperishable  interest  to 
noble  souls.  To  one,  it  is  a  flaming  beacon 
soaring  in  the  sky,  inviting  the  spiritual  mariner 
to  a  confident  hope  in  its  guidance.  To  another,  it  is 
the  pearl  reposing  on  the  bed  of  the  deep,  of  priceless 
worth,  elusive,  rare,  and  only  to  be  found  after  the 
most  inveterate  search.  Truth  has  its  variant  forms, 
rich  in  color  and  electric  with  power.  To  one  age,  it 
is  embodied  in  a  fact,  and  the  imperial  scepter  is  its 
stern  symbol  upon  whose  golden  stem  the  idea  of  law 
is  inscribed.  For  another  age,  it  is  summed  up  in  a 
creed,  a  code  of  religious  thought  sealed  and  clamped 
by  the  hand  of  authority.  Yet  another  era  sees  truth 
in  the  chemistry  of  the  atom  and  nowhere  else.  Its 
infinitesimal  aspect  we  must  examine,  if  we  would 
reach  the  heart  of  truth.  Thus,  truth  from  one  point  of 
view  is  "  all  things  to  all  men." 

In  the  mind  of  Jesus,  however,  truth  had  a  solitary 
relation.  He  dealt  with  no  truth  save  that  which 
sprang  at  once  from  the  being  of  God.  The  acute  spec- 
ulations of  wise  men,  even  the  superb  adumbrations  of 
theoretic  truth  as  found  in  the  Epic  of  His  own  liter- 
ature did  not  engage  His  thought.    He  saw  straight 

164 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         155 

through  the  riven  heaven  to  the  Father  and  caught  up 
that  truth,  which  the  Spirit  on  wings  of  revelation  was 
at  length  to  lodge  in  the  hearts  of  men. 
We  consider  in  this  verse : 

1.  The  truth  presented  to  the  world ;  and 

2.  The  ineptitude  of  the  world  to  receive  it. 


It  were  vain  to  attempt  a  definition  of  truth.  Every 
such  attempt  involves  the  maker  in  a  hopeless  tangle. 
He  carries  at  best  no  clearer  light  than  the  ancient 
Cynic,  who  went  about  the  streets  with  his  lantern 
looking  for  an  honest  man.  Yet  certain  secure  lines 
are  recorded  in  the  spectrum  of  truth,  just  as  soon  as 
we  get  within  the  circuit  of  divine  influence.  Let  us 
put  our  telescope  up  to  the  vaulted  blue  and  gather  its 
reflected  hues. 

We  find  at  once  that  truth  is  positive  and  sure.  I  do 
not  mean  that  it  is  fixed  by  some  decree  of  court  or 
senate.  Nor  do  I  mean  that  a  company  of  savants 
deliberated  long  and  earnestly  on  its  terms,  and  finally 
agreed  as  to  how  they  should  be  stated.  Truth  is 
not  made;  it  is  organic.  Truth  is  vital  with  the  vigor 
of  reality.  You  would  not  say  that  life  was  given  to 
the  tree ;  it  is  present  in  the  arteries  of  a  tree,  because 
it  is  a  tree.  Life  is  bound  up  with  its  organ.  They 
used  to  say  that  a  hand  was  not  a  hand,  if  it  were 
dead ;  it  was  simply  a  piece  of  mouldering  matter.  If 
you  wish  to  get  at  truth  you  must  find  something  which 
is  real.  No  body  of  men  can  make  a  thing  real  by 
voting  it  so.  I  observe  a  distinguished  educator  has 
announced  his  conviction  that  there  is  no  heaven  and 
there  is  no  hell.    He  establishes  a  fact  by  citing  his 


156  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

opinion.  The  method  will  not  suffice.  We  need  some- 
thing more  than  the  testimony  of  one  man  or  the  con- 
currence of  every  learned  society  in  the  world.  Truth 
is  not  a  question  of  what  you  think  but  of  what 
actually  is. 

Let  us  rise  to  the  pinnacle  of  thought.  What  shall 
I  say  about  the  truth  of  God?  That  is  to  say,  does 
truth  mean  for  me  that  God  exists  in  all  His  infinite 
majesty,  His  wisdom.  His  unmatched  goodness ;  or  does 
truth  imply  simply  that  I  think  of  God  as  existing,  and 
so  dear  a  thought  awakes  the  spirit  of  worship  in  me? 
This  is  not  alone  a  query,  believe  me,  for  the  man  who 
is  trained  in  theology.  Its  current  is  wider.  He  who 
sails  the  sea  and  battles  with  its  hydra-headed  dangers 
must  know  the  import  of  my  question.  He  who  deals 
with  the  common  elements  of  business,  who  realizes  the 
perishableness  of  goods  and  the  fatuity  of  ambition, 
he  must  know,  if  there  be  a  God ;  or  every  sanction  of 
right  will  be  shivered.  And  every  man  who  stoops  be- 
neath the  load  of  sorrow,  enters  his  Gethsemane  and 
sees  no  light  ahead,  shall  surely  sink  into  Stygian 
darkness,  if  the  glowing  light  of  divine  Love  be  not  in 
his  spiritual  sky.  Truth  is  not  a  matter  of  opinion; 
truth  is  eternally  fixed.  For  the  man,  for  the  child, 
for  the  brute  savage,  for  the  Chesterfields  of  human 
culture,  truth  is  always  one.  It  depends  on  no  con- 
vention; it  is  vocalized  by  no  particular  school.  It 
cannot  be  changed  by  the  most  radical  discoveries  of 
science.  It  will  not  be  silenced  by  dogma,  though 
couched  in  the  most  bewitching  tones.  It  has  the  sting 
of  eternity  in  it  and  cannot  be  disarmed. 

We  take  up  a  second  aspect  of  truth  and  penetrate 
deeper  into  the  heart  of  Christ.  Truth  for  Him  was 
ever  personal.    It  could  not  be  divorced  from  the  life 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         157 

of  spirit.  So  high  a  theme  He  enshrined  in  His  un- 
equaled  definition  of  God,  a  "  spirit,  and  they  that 
worship  Him  must  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in 
truth."  Spirit  and  truth  are  welded  into  one.  They 
are  but  reverse  sides  of  the  shield  of  divine  personality. 
Jesus  thus  thought  of  truth  as  being  breathed  out  of 
spirit.  He  did  not  teach  His  disciples  in  the  abstract 
and  vague  terms  of  philosophy.  Truth  to  Him  was  not 
abstract;  it  was  the  most  definite  thing  conceivable. 
He  did  not  set  the  sins  of  men  on  one  side  of  an 
equation  and  the  mercy  of  God  on  the  other,  and  then 
prove  them  to  be  interchangeable.  He  said,  "  The  Son 
of  man  is  come  to  seek  and  to  save,  that  which  was  lost." 
He  did  not  show  up  the  blank  vacuity  of  the  Galilean 
mind  and  then  expound  the  infinite  reaches  of  truth. 
He  said,  "  When  He,  the  spirit  of  truth  is  come,  he 
shall  guide  you  into  all  truth."  Truth  is  hence  a 
most  practical  matter.  It  deals  with  problems  that 
face  the  soul.  It  is  not  written  alone  on  rock  and 
hillside  or  animal  tissue  or  the  lobes  of  the  brain. 
Truth  is  there,  and  modern  science  has  extracted  its 
meaning  to  the  everlasting  benefit  of  the  race.  For  all 
scientific  truth  has  practical  value.  The  naturalist,  of 
course,  does  not  follow  up  his  clues  just  for  the  sake 
of  arriving  at  results  that  may  be  of  use  to  his  fellow- 
men.  The  disinterested  pursuit  of  knowledge  is  its 
first  concern.  Still,  when  electric  energy  can  be 
chained,  geared,  reduced  to  service,  and  in  a  moment  of 
great  emergency  save  hundreds  of  lives  from  a  watery 
grave  by  its  unwired  currents,  then  we  say  that  truth 
is  more  than  theory;  it  has  the  heaven-born  gift  of 
being  useful  to  lives  that  can  appreciate  its  meaning. 

I  conceive  truth  to  be  of  this  form,  the  truth,  that  is, 
which  girds  and  redeems  the  soul.     I  regard  truth 


158  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

as  the  one  force,  which  excites  to  action  the  moral 
qualities  of  the  heart.  Truth  does  not  act  on  flesh  and 
blood;  flesh  and  blood  cannot  enter  the  kingdom  of 
God.  The  challenge  of  Holy  Writ  is  straightforward. 
It  will  not  countenance  any  idea  of  the  soul  that  makes 
it  a  mere  complex  of  organic  forces.  Do  you  think 
you  really  live  because  the  heart  beats  and  the  lungs 
respire,  because  the  nerves  react  and  the  brain  responds 
to  suggestion?  Is  intelligence  the  combination  of 
certain  gases?  Is  conscience  the  register  of  physical 
pains  and  pleasures,  and  nothing  more?  Does  immor- 
tality become  an  illusive  dream  in  view  of  the  stern 
dissolution  of  the  body's  elements?  Truth  lays  the 
finger  of  hope  on  the  soul.  It  does  more;  it  begets 
an  undying  conviction.  It  is  wrapped  up  in  the 
heavenly  Spirit,  and  having  so  high  a  heritage  it  surely 
could  not  be  content  to  play  here  on  the  perishing  par- 
ticles of  earth. 

The  point  is  clear:  if  we  are  going  to  receive  truth, 
we  must  receive  it  with  our  spiritual  nature.  Let  us 
take  an  example.  I  am  weighted  with  a  sense  of 
responsibility.  I  believe  that  I  ought  to  do  a  certain 
thing.  The  case  is  perfectly  plain  to  me.  Duty  lies 
upon  me  like  a  terrible  burden.  I  cannot  explain  it  by 
reference  to  the  customs  of  the  race;  it  might  be  an 
instance,  when  the  race  did  not  agree  with  me.  We 
will  say,  the  duty  has  to  do  with  some  act  that  may 
cost  the  life.  Every  racial  prompting  says :  "  Save 
your  life,  don't  give  it  away.  Life  is  precious ;  you  owe 
to  family  and  friend  to  preserve  it  intact."  But  the 
conviction  refuses  to  yield ;  happiness  departs  from  my 
mind;  the  lights  of  earth  grow  dim,  unsatisfying;  I 
lose  my  appetite  and  dwindle  in  flesh;  I  am  mentally 
almost  on  the  edge  of  despair.    Then  I  determine  to 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         159 

obey  the  inner  voice.  The  whole  horizon  is  lighted  with 
a  supernal  glow,  contentment  reigns,  life  assumes  a 
new  and  more  benevolent  aspect,  I  brave  the  dangers 
of  a  consecrated  life,  and  if  I  surrender  the  encasement 
I  have  my  soul  left  to  me  uninjured.  I  have  done  my 
duty.  That  I  take  to  be  truth  in  the  moral  sphere. 
You  may  not  be  able  to  define  its  parts ;  nor  may  you 
analyze  successfully  the  stimulus  it  exerts.  But  you 
know  this,  that  until  its  terms  were  obeyed  life  for 
you  was  not  worth  its  spark. 

Let  me  avail  myself  of  this  opportunity  to  say  that 
Christian  truth  has  in  it  a  driving-wheel  of  great 
power.  It  sets  in  motion  the  sluggish  affections  of  the 
soul.  It  grinds  off  the  rust,  that  has  gathered  on  the 
nobler  habits.  It  draws  behind  it  a  load  of  weaker 
souls  that  in  themselves  apparently  have  no  "  will  to 
do."  Such  is  truth,  as  entertained  by  religious  minds 
and  held,  as  I  think,  by  the  Lord  Himself. 

We  take  another  step  forward.  Truth  we  declare  to 
be  unchanging,  and  truth  we  regard  as  fitted  to  the 
uses  of  our  mind.  But  how  shall  this  truth  find  its 
place  within  our  breasts?  The  problem  is  age-long 
and  has  never  but  once  been  answered  satisfactorily. 
It  has  its  peculiar  difficulties,  and  we  dare  not  despise 
them.  I  do  not  intend  to  consider  the  matter  in  a 
trifling  way.  No  man  has  a  right  to  dismiss  the 
question  of  revelation  either  as  easily  solved  or  as  un- 
worthy serious  thought.  Truth  comes  to  us  by  the 
medium  of  mind;  this  is  the  first  difficulty;  and  the 
second  is  like  unto  it :  the  mind  can  reveal  its  contents 
only  by  language.  Thought  that  you  see  written  on  the 
face  is  of  little  consequence;  it  is  subject  to  a  hun- 
dred interpretations.  We  need  a  spoken  medium.  But 
words  may  bear  different  meanings.    And  when  you 


160  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

translate  the  ideas  from  one  language  to  another 
you  increase  the  difficulty  in  proportion. 

Let  us  take  up  the  latter  fact  first.  Did  you  ever 
realize  what  a  grave  situation  you  accept,  when  you 
try  to  repeat  another's  statement?  You  have  to  re- 
produce not  only  his  words  and  the  ideas  they  embody ; 
you  are  obliged  to  set  up  again  his  state  of  mind,  the 
intention  behind  the  words,  the  manner  of  life  that  is 
reflected  in  his  motives;  that  is  to  say,  the  very  man 
himself.  It  is  no  facile  task,  then,  to  interpret  your 
neighbor's  words.  We  know  how  stale  and  pointless 
our  rehearsal  of  a  great  orator's  address  is.  Try  to 
read  Mr.  Lincoln's  words  at  Gettysburg,  charged  with 
the  honesty  of  a  great  life  and  the  holy  sorrows  of  a 
stricken  nation,  and  you  see  what  an  impossible  task 
is  yours.  I  can  understand  nothing  less  than  this  as 
the  duty  of  Peter  and  John  and  Paul  and  the  other 
Apostolic  men,  who  were  appointed  to  write  down  the 
wholesome  truths  of  revelation.  Language  fails  to  take 
up  the  stream  of  truth  into  its  channel.  Truth  has  too 
much  of  the  fecund  turbulence  of  heaven  in  it.  And 
yet  this  is  the  very  thing  they  had  to  do.  Do  you 
wonder  that  Paul  cries  out  in  utter  desperateness  of 
the  truth's  profusion:  "That  ye  may  be  able  to  com- 
prehend .  .  .  the  love  of  Christ,  which  passes  com- 
prehension" ! 

Then,  there  is  the  difficulty  of  the  use  of  the  mind 
as  a  medium  for  revelation.  How  can  the  mind  be  the 
storehouse  of  infallible  truth?  We  know  how  pale  is 
our  interpretation  of  the  evidence  of  God  about  us. 
Let  men  study  the  beauty  of  a  flower;  some  like  Lin- 
naeus will  bow  their  heads  and  worship.  Others  will 
dissect  its  beauty  away  and  sternly  resolve  it  into  its 
class.     Let  men  view  the  movements  of  human  life. 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         161 

A  giant  ship  goes  down  amid  a  sea  of  ice,  carrying  to 
unnamed  graves  a  vast  multitude  of  precious  souls. 
How  do  you  understand  the  religious  import?  It  will 
be  written  down  in  the  records  as  an  "  act  of  God." 
Is  the  lesson  that  confronts  us  not  only  one  of  possible 
carelessness  but  also  the  deeper  one,  that  after  all  we 
are  in  the  hollow  of  His  hand,  as  a  cartoon  strikingly 
shows?  Still  greater  diflSculties  are  met  when  we  enter 
the  field  of  revelation.  We  do  not  see  how  truth  can 
get  into  the  incapacious  minds  of  men;  we  do  not 
see  how  God  can  support  His  divinity  within  the  nar- 
row confines  of  a  human  body;  we  are  loath  to  admit 
that  a  cruel  Cross  may  bear  the  weight  of  the  world's 
sin;  we  stand  unconvinced  before  the  riven  cave,  and 
hear  with  unresponsive  hearts  that  life  and  immortality 
have  issued  therefrom. 

Nevertheless,  the  Christian  scheme  makes  this  Book 
a  Book  of  authority,  because  it  enfolds  the  truth.  The 
sequence  is  this :  first  the  truth,  then  the  authority  that 
truth  carries,  and  lastly,  truth  and  authority  dwelling 
together  in  a  Book.  Let  me  illustrate.  Sin  as  a  fact 
has  always  been  on  the  platform  of  history.  The  truth 
as  to  the  meaning  of  sin  is  crystallized  in  this  Book 
alone.  Ideas  of  all  shades  of  gravity  have  clustered 
about  the  word.  It  has  meant  a  physical  defect,  a  lack 
of  knowledge,  a  stage  in  racial  development,  which  will 
one  day  be  passed  by,  disobedience  to  the  established 
rules  of  society,  some  violation  of  the  moral  sense 
which  has  been  gradually  mortised  into  the  mind  of 
the  race.  The  Bible  rejects  every  one,  and  holds  that 
sin  is  a  direct  revolt  against  the  law  of  God.  The 
truth  of  sin  is  now  revealed  and  that  revelation  brings 
a  mighty  burden  to  the  minds  of  men.  It  unfolds  the 
seriousness  of  sin;  it  shows  us  that  we  cannot  cover 


162  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

it  with  the  expedients  so  triumphantly  pursued  by 
uninspired  religions.  Sin  stares  us  in  the  face  with  a 
haunting  look  of  despair.  But  how  does  its  truth 
reach  the  heart?  By  the  divine  Word  which  we  call 
the  Bible.  Follow  the  course  of  this  Book's  influence. 
See  it,  as  the  wonders  of  art  spring  from  its  magnetic 
atmosphere;  see  it,  as  it  lays  the  fangs  of  truth  upon 
the  strongest  governments  of  earth;  mark  its  majestic 
tread,  as  monarchs  of  mental  power  fall  in  abject  sur- 
render before  its  message.  This  is  truth,  streaming 
from  a  Book;  truth  with  unflinching  loyalty  to  itself; 
truth  with  the  will  of  God  behind  it.  This  is  the  truth 
that  Jesus  came  to  reveal,  and  this  the  eternal  truth 
which  the  Spirit  of  truth  forces  upon  the  attention 
of  mankind. 

II 

The  second  part  of  the  text  deals  with  the  reception 
of  truth  by  the  world.  It  marks  a  cleavage  in  the  des- 
tiny of  souls.  No  man  can  ever  be  the  same,  after  he 
has  passed  under  the  shadow  of  the  Cross,  just  as  no 
metal  can  pass  through  a  magnetic  field  without  evinc- 
ing its  peculiar  character.  It  either  suffers  attraction, 
or  it  does  not.  Calvary  is  the  critical  point  for  human 
life.  Love  which  is  sceptered  there  will  excite  a  pro- 
found devotion  or  an  embittered  defiance.  Our  Saviour 
was  quite  aware  of  the  divisive  tendency  of  His  truth. 
Even  at  the  term  of  His  earthly  ministry,  on  the  verge 
of  His  exaltation,  when  the  glorious  Figure  of  the  Risen 
Christ  stood  before  dazzled  eyes,  it  is  recorded  that 
they  "  worshipped  him,  but  some  doubted."  He  was 
aware  of  a  latent  incapacity  for  belief  in  the  minds 
of  many.  Truth  and  worldly  assent  do  not  go  to- 
gether.   Chemists  seek  in  vain  to  mingle  certain  prim- 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         163 

itive  elements ;  they  cannot  mix  oil  and  water.  Botan- 
ists labor  zealously  to  acclimatize  the  products  of  the 
upper  zones  in  the  soil  of  the  tropics;  they  meet  noth- 
ing but  reproof  from  an  unwilling  nature.  We  have 
heard  of  mystical  minds,  that  are  immune  to  scientific 
demonstration;  they  must  go  to  the  goal  by  the  path 
of  insight,  or  not  at  all.  We  have  come  in  touch  per- 
haps with  practical  souls  to  whom  the  rhythm,  the 
color,  the  playful  fancy  of  poetry  is  a  foreign  sub- 
stance; they  cannot  take  it  in.  The  bent  in  each 
case  is  the  work  of  nature,  or  once  in  a  while  the  result 
of  a  faulty  education.  The  bent  of  the  unspiritual 
man  is  the  bent  of  nature,  confirmed  by  a  voluntary 
pursuit  of  unspiritual  ends.  It  can  be  cured,  while 
the  dissidence  of  chemical  elements  is  perpetual;  but 
it  will  only  be  cured,  after  the  heart  has  gone  down 
into  the  valley  of  rigid  examination  under  the  guidance 
of  the  divine  Spirit.  We  are  now  concerned  not  with 
the  change  but  with  the  natural  bent. 

It  is  clear  from  the  words  of  Jesus  that  the  un- 
tempered  soul  cannot  see.  We  shall  not  venture  to  read 
the  habits  of  a  scientific  age  into  the  mind  of  Jesus. 
And  yet  it  is  perfectly  safe  to  say  that  the  kind  of  sight 
here  intended  is  that  of  the  body.  The  eye  is  one  of 
the  most  important  instruments  for  the  study  of 
nature.  Astronomy  as  an  exact  science  would  be  im- 
possible, if  the  faculty  of  sight  did  not  bring  the  mes- 
sage of  the  stars  within  the  range  of  investigation.  So 
central  to  right  thinking  is  the  eye  considered  by  many, 
that  one  of  the  most  effective  workers  in  British  phil- 
osophy began  his  tasks  with  a  study  of  the  eye  and 
its  vision.  This  means,  that  all  truth,  for  the  man  of 
science,  must  have  for  its  touchstone  the  evidence  of 
the  senses.    There  is  no  truth  for  him  apart  from  the 


164  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

hard  facts  which  the  nerves  of  the  body  record.  I 
think,  we  may  pass  directly  from  the  seething  labo- 
ratory of  the  chemist  into  the  melting-room  of  his  re- 
ligion, and  find  the  same  rules  applied  in  both. 
Spiritual  truth  does  not  deserve  treatment  different 
from  that  we  give  to  the  awards  of  consciousness.  If 
it  gets  anything  else,  it  is  not  fit  to  be  called  truth  but 
mere  opinion.  Such  is  the  attitude  described  by  Christ 
in  His  searching  words.  Let  us  see  how  inexorably 
true  they  are. 

Well,  we  meet  at  once  the  fact  that  the  eye  can  take 
in  material  substance  and  nothing  beyond  it.  You  can 
see  the  body  of  a  man,  but  not  his  soul.  Various  ex- 
perimenters have  tried  to  get  a  photograph  of  the  soul, 
so  to  speak.  They  have  found  a  kind  of  light-ring 
girdling  the  body,  a  magnetic  effusion,  and  this  they 
have  called  the  contour  of  the  soul.  I  do  not  care  to 
define  my  spirit.  There  is  no  serviceable  end  to  be 
gained.  It  is  like  unto  the  divine  Spirit,  for  we  are 
made  in  His  image.  I  am  content  to  let  the  case  rest 
there.  But  whatever  the  soul  may  be,  it  is  to  us  so  in- 
contestibly  clear  that  it  cannot  be  viewed  as  matter  is 
viewed.  To  speak  of  a  "  beautiful  soul,"  as  some  poets 
do,  is  to  misjudge  its  nature  and  confine  its  prospects. 
The  soul  of  Robert  Browning  may  be  beautiful  in  the 
sense  that  it  was  fitted  with  the  noble  traits  of  wis- 
dom, insight,  sympathy,  and  profound  religious  con- 
viction. It  was  not  beautiful  in  the  sense  that  you 
could  examine  it  as  you  examined  the  body  in  which 
it  reposed. 

For  this  reason  the  untaught  mind  cannot  look 
through  the  eyes  of  the  body  into  the  Holy  Spirit.  No 
man  can  see  God.  If  you  decline  to  believe  in  Him, 
because  your  physical  senses  give  you  no  image,  then 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         165 

you  will  never  reach  His  side.  He  will  be  only  a  myth, 
endowed,  indeed,  with  the  plastic  attributes  that  fancy 
or  fervor  has  conceived,  and  yet  just  a  myth!  Oh,  if 
Reason  could  stand  unashamed,  anointed,  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  King ;  if  she  could  understand  how  vain  are 
her  rigorous  formulas,  her  canons  of  truth,  her  methods 
of  inquiry;  if  she  could  once  catch  the  glint  of  imperial 
wisdom  shining  down  the  corridors  of  time, — how 
simple  would  the  truth  of  God  then  seem,  and  with 
what  quickened  footstep  would  she  run  to  meet  the 
advances  of  the  star-lit  Spirit,  who  has  promised  to 
lead  into  all  truth! 

I  am  reminded,  again,  that  sight  is  after  all  an  im- 
perfect instrument  for  research.  It  sees  one  side  of 
the  case.  Look,  for  instance,  at  yonder  house  and 
suppose  that  you  have  no  other  means  for  filling  out  the 
details.  What  idea  would  you  get  of  the  object?  You 
might  see  three  corners  of  the  building  but  could  not 
possibly  see  the  fourth.  If  you  stood  on  the  ground 
near  the  house,  you  could  not  tell  what  was  the  com- 
position of  the  roof.  The  interior  is  entirely  hid  from 
your  sight,  if  the  windows  be  closed.  You  could  merely 
guess  how  many  rooms  there  were,  and  their  several 
locations.  In  fact,  the  knowledge  gained  by  the  organ 
of  sight  is  extremely  limited.  I  think  the  Lord  has  this 
in  mind  as  He  recites  the  ineptitude  of  the  world  for 
spiritual  truth.  We  do  get  a  hint  of  truth,  here  and 
there.  It  would  be  folly  to  hold  that  the  natural  man 
lived  absolutely  a  stranger  to  the  motions  of  honor  or 
right.  Certain  virtues  seem  to  grow  luxuriantly  in 
soils  unfertilized  by  Christian  grace.  Courage,  the 
finest  human  quality  in  ancient  Rome,  sometimes  finds 
the  heart  of  a  Christian  a  shabby  place  to  live  in. 
But  while  this  is  true,  we  must  not  overlook  a  greater 


166  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

fact  that  the  roundness  of  virtue  cannot  be  discovered 
apart  from  the  sanctifying  influence  of  truth.  Love, 
sacrificial,  self-abnegating  love,  is  at  home  in  the 
Christian  heart,  and  in  none  other.  And  since  love  is 
the  fulfilling  of  the  law,  if  that  be  absent  other  virtues 
soon  sink  into  fatigue. 

I  am  reminded,  too,  that  sight  is  uncertain  and  at  last 
fails  altogether.  If  you  want  to  find  out  how  uncertain 
and  hence  untrustworthy  sight  is,  take  a  piece  of  ground 
and  measure  it  off  four  or  five  times.  Each  time  the 
result  will  be  different  and  you  will  come  away  a  dis- 
appointed but  a  wiser  man.  Now  such  being  the  case, 
how,  we  ask,  can  the  eye  or  its  faculty  of  vision  be  a 
proper  instrument  for  perceiving  the  divine  truth? 
Or,  how  can  the  mind  that  directs  the  vision  presume 
to  clasp  in  its  embrace  the  sacred  oracles  of  God? 
How,  in  fine,  may  I  presume  to  challenge  the  truth  of 
the  great  Atonement,  simply  because  I  see  the  work- 
ings of  grace  through  eyes  that  are  accustomed  to  the 
selfish  habits  of  earth?  Yet  even  here  we  come  upon 
evidences  of  substitution;  strong,  chivalrous  manhood, 
yielding  its  place  in  the  lifeboats,  that  those  of  lesser 
resource  may  be  saved.  I  do  not  see,  why  with  such 
hallowed  examples  before  the  eye  we  may  not  run  up 
the  shining  way  and  exchanging  faith  for  sight  accept 
the  mysteries  of  grace,  as  unfolded  in  the  Person  of  the 
Christ. 

It  is  clear  from  the  words  of  Jesus  that  the  unin- 
structed  world  cannot  know  the  truth.  "  To  know " 
carries  us  deeper  into  human  experience  than  "  to  see." 
We  drop  now  the  organs  of  the  body  and  enter  the 
palladium  of  the  mind.  Here  all  is  quiet;  the  diver- 
sions of  sense,  the  constant  impact  of  outward  forces 
are  gone.    We  are  alone,  so  to  speak,  with  the  shadows 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         167 

of  eternity,  and  our  duty  is  to  turn  the  suspicions  of 
the  mind  into  living  substance.  Can  we  do  it?  Christ 
says,  the  world  is  at  a  standstill  in  this  region ;  it  can- 
not know.  But  why?  The  true  disciple  knows;  for 
he  afiSrms  this  in  the  closing  words  of  the  verse.  What 
makes  the  crucial  difference  between  the  church  and 
thesurging  world  about  it?  I  think,  I  can  tell  you.  In 
the  first  place,  the  world  is  withoat  sympathetic  in- 
sight into  the  ways  by  which  truth  is  manifested.  You 
can  see  how  grossly  neglectful  selfish  man  has  been  of 
certain  social  ideas  that  gradually  but  surely  attain 
their  flower.  The  idea  of  human  equality  in  the  sight 
of  law  is  of  very  recent  acceptance.  For  centuries 
might  and  not  right  held  sway  in  the  counsels  of  gov- 
ernment. Only  in  sporadic  cases,  long  separated  in 
time  and  place,  did  the  essential  supremacy  of  the 
citizen  secure  its  vindication.  The  world  would  not 
accept  it.  Can  we  expect  aught  else  in  the  higher 
domain  of  spiritual  life?  How  can  the  heart  that 
loves  its  own  pleasure  square  its  habits  with  the  un- 
defiled  holiness  of  God?  How  can  the  mind,  charmed, 
excited  by  the  ceaseless  enticements  of  sense,  curb  its 
frenzies  and  settle  down  to  a  serious  look  at  eternity? 
And  the  conscience,  that  silent  monitor  within,  blurred 
by  a  thousand  foibles,  checkmated  by  passion  and  greed 
— how  can  it  stand  up  and  claim  the  reward  of  a 
righteous  life?  The  world  does  not  understand  the 
ways  of  God  and  hence  cannot  receive  His  truth. 

Once  more,  there  are  to  the  selfish  heart  no  means 
of  interpreting  the  given  signs.  God  does  not  leave 
Himself  without  witness,  as  Paul  said.  You  need  not 
look  to  distant  ages  for  a  show  of  divine  providence  or 
for  the  promotion  of  eternal  right  by  the  solemn  events 
of  Time.    We  are  girt  with  convincing  signs  in  history, 


168  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

if  we  stop  to  study  their  import.  India  today  sees  the 
loosening  of  the  chains  of  caste.  Has  commerce  caused 
it?  Has  the  entrance  of  an  alien  political  force  effected 
the  change?  Has  the  pinch  of  poverty  or  the  rise  of  a 
new  social  order  made  the  difference?  These  have 
doubtless  helped.  But  the  real  alchemy  is  in  the  Chris- 
tian religion,  which  is  slowly  laying  its  transmuting 
power  over  the  ancient  soil  of  hatred,  contempt,  and 
dread.  The  sign  is  not  as  yet  entirely  clear,  save  for 
intuitive  minds.  The  time  is  coming,  when  he  alone 
will  be  unconvinced  who  does  not  wish  to  be. 

Then,  study  another  sign,  the  most  powerful  ever 
granted  the  human  race,  a  sign  instinct  with  promise, 
inscribed  with  letters  of  a  celestial  Hand  and  called 
by  Christ  the  "sign  of  the  Prophet  Jonah."  It  is  a 
symbol  merely,  when  taken  by  itself.  The  cross  car- 
ries in  its  crude  material  shape  no  power  better  or 
fuller  than  that  which  slept  in  the  cup  of  hemlock. 
Safety  and  hope  do  not  repose  in  a  cross;  it  is  the 
medium  by  which  the  massive  truths  of  heaven  are 
exposed  to  view.  The  mistake  of  the  matter-of-fact 
world  is  that  it  puts  the  sign  for  the  thing  signified, 
and  then  complains  that  it  cannot  understand !  Cover 
up  the  cross  but  expose  the  Deity  that  hung  there. 
Conceal  the  blood-stains  but  dwell  on  the  love  that 
made  them.  Put  away  the  uninviting  specter  of  death 
but  remember  that  Jesus  died  for  the  world's  iniqui- 
ties. Then  you  get  the  value  of  the  Cross,  and  about 
its  head  gathers  the  light  of  an  uninterrupted  Re- 
demption. 

Can  the  mind  of  man  untempered  by  grace  reach  the 
height  of  faith  thus  revealed?  Can  the  world  know  the 
Cross  and  its  undying  truth,  so  long  as  it  holds  to  its 
own  method  of  interpretation?    Never!    Truth  does 


INEPTITUDE  OF  THE  WORLD         169 

not  pass  through  the  crucible  of  knowledge.  Truth 
will  not  dissolve  into  its  elements  at  the  touch  of 
science.  Truth  needs  faith,  such  faith,  such  surrender 
as  Saul  of  Tarsus  evinced,  when  the  reasons  of  logic 
and  the  ceremonies  of  the  law  vanished  like  wisps 
of  morning  vapor  before  the  ascending  sun.  Truth 
comes,  when  you  face  the  gleaming  Presence  of  the 
Saviour  and  commit  your  soul  to  Him.  Otherwise  it 
will  be  a  dream. 


XI 
LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN 

John  14:19.     "Because  I  live,  ye  shall 
live  also." 

LIFE  is  the  one  problem  in  the  world's  eye  that 
J  refuses  to  be  solved.  We  may  not  be  always  and 
altogether  sure  of  the  varying  forms  of  mechani- 
cal power.  Light  and  heat,  chemical  affinity  and 
electric  energy  are  children  of  the  same  natural  stock ; 
but  their  interrelation  at  times  escapes  the  attention 
of  the  most  careful  observer.  Still,  we  know  them  to 
be  convertible  terms.  The  same  batteries,  when  prop- 
erly charged,  can  scorch,  illuminate,  send  the  voice 
along  the  wire,  or  drive  the  heavy  train.  You  can  find 
out  the  reason  by  sitting  down  with  the  physicist  in  his 
laboratory  and  following  his  movements.  The  prob- 
lem is  at  length  simple. 

But  the  matter  of  life  is  not  simple.  It  has  taxed 
the  capacity  of  the  acutest  minds  and  is  now  as  reti- 
cent of  its  secrets,  as  it  ever  was.  If  your  informant 
tells  you  that  life  is  only  function, — material  atoms 
acting  in  a  certain  way, — you  are  at  liberty  to  ask  him, 
Why  should  and  must  they  act  in  precisely  this  way 
and  no  other?  He  may  know  their  composition,  their 
arrangement  into  a  unitary  structure,  for  example, 
the  brain;  but  he  cannot  tell  you  how  that  structure 
begins  to  act  nor  what  that  subtle  principle  within  is, 
by  which  its  organic  form  is  maintained.  This  is  true 
in  physical  life.    It  is  comprehensively  involved  in  the 

170 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN       171 

relations  of  spirit.  Jesus  takes  up  the  age-long  prob- 
lem: He  solves  it.  He  alone  has  solved  it.  He  does 
not  unravel  it  by  the  help  of  argument.  He  states 
the  simple  connection  between  Himself  and  His  dis- 
ciple,\and  rests  the  case  there. 

I  propose  to  determine  two  points: 
First,  the  compass  of  spiritual  life,  and 
Secondly,  its  superhuman  origin. 


We  are  engaged  in  a  diflScult  pursuit  and  need  all 
the  light  that  common  experience  can  throw  on  our 
path.  The  analogy  of  life  in  body  and  life  in  spirit 
is  extremely  close  and  has  been  used  with  great  free- 
dom by  Scriptural  writers.  We  shall  use  it  in  dis- 
cussing the  assertion  of  our  Lord.  Let  it  be  under- 
stood, however,  that  we  are  propounding  no  theory  of 
organic  energy.  Our  sole  aim  is  to  cut  a  few  seg- 
ments of  truth  out  of  the  circle  of  celestial  life,  which 
we  believe  to  be  embodied  in  the  heart  of  Christ. 

We  begin  with  the  fact  that  life  is  an  inward  im- 
pulse and  is  not  imposed  upon  the  organism  from  wi  th 
out.  You  can  put  power  into  a  machine  but  you  car 
not  put  life  into  a  body.  One  very  plain  evidence  of 
life  is  the  ability  to  produce  motion.  I  speak  now  uf 
animal  life.  The  motion  of  an  organism  is  not  the 
same  as  the  motion  of  a  stone.  The  direction  might  be 
the  same  and  the  curves  described  quite  identical.  But 
the  stone  comes  to  rest,  and  remains  at  rest  until 
moved  by  an  external  force;  while  the  organic  body 
resumes  its  motion  without  any  aid  from  a  foreign 
object.  And  it  resumes  its  motion  with  an  end  in 
view;  it  seeks  food.     Very  rudimentary  may  be  the 


172  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

line  of  movement,  merely  this  way  and  then  that;  but 
it  has  a  meaning  not  inherent  in  the  motion  of  the  tiny 
chip  caught  in  the  eddy.  It  must  satisfy  the  needs  of 
its  nutritive  organ,  that  is  to  say,  the  demands  of  life. 

Let  us  illustrate  the  presence  of  an  inward  impulse 
by  a  fascinating  example.  Examine  the  wonderful 
structure  of  the  human  eye.  No  more  intricate  mechan- 
ism was  ever  devised.  The  perfect  adaptation  of  organ 
to  function,  of  means  to  end,  is  here  displayed.  But  of 
what  use  is  this  splendid  equipment  of  cornea,  tissues, 
lens  and  nerves,  if  there  be  no  life  behind  it?  A  mul- 
titude of  investigators  have  held  that  the  function  of 
sight  has  been  gradually  fashioned  by  the  effect  of 
light  on  the  surface  of  the  rudimentary  body.  Though 
all  the  facts  discount  the  theory,  suppose,  for  a  moment, 
that  it  were  true.  Again,  I  ask,  of  what  service  would 
the  newly  determined  function  be,  if  there  were  no  in- 
ward power  to  keep  it  going?  Or,  deeper  than  that, 
would  the  most  thoroughgoing  evolutionist  think  of 
inserting  a  faculty  like  sight  into  any  object  save  that 
which  already  possessed  life?  The  eye  can  exercise  its 
function,  simply  because  life  courses  through  its  deli- 
cate arteries,  and  because  the  brain  fed  by  life  sets  the 
optic  nerve  in  motion.    Life  is  an  inward  impulse. 

The  analogy,  as  I  suggested,  is  close.  I  am  charged 
at  this  point  with  declaring  that  Christ  is  the  pos- 
sessor of  unoriginated  life.  It  is  a  theme  that  John, 
His  intimate  friend,  loved  to  dwell  on.  He  did  not  be- 
lieve, he  could  not  believe  that  spiritual  power  was 
settled  on  his  Lord  by  some  alien  authority.  He  re- 
garded Him  as  the  Word  of  God,  the  express  output 
of  divine  Life.  As  the  Word  is  the  safest  token  of 
the  mind,  so  Christ  was  the  exact  revelation  of  God. 
He  loved  to  dwell  on  the  vital  aspects  of  the  Word. 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN       173 

Life  is  one  of  his  slogans.  He  seemed  to  pick  out  the 
sentences  that  gleamed  with  this  cardinal  truth.  Pon- 
der this  one : — "  As  the  Father  hath  life  in  himself,  so 
hath  he  given  to  the  Son  to  have  life  in  himself."  That 
does  not  imply  that  God  deliberately  injected  into  the 
bosom  of  the  Son,  what  was  not  formerly  his  own.  It 
means  that  with  the  manifestation  of  His  grace  to  man- 
kind the  life  of  deity  came  to  its  highest  outward 
potency.  Very  differently  has  the  skeptical  world 
thought  of  the  Nazarene.  It  has  seen  in  Him  a  moral 
energy  seething  with  human  passion,  that  had  been 
kindled  into  flame  by  contact  with  the  unholy  motives 
of  His  day.  It  has  crowned  Him  with  the  halo  of 
martyrdom  and  given  Him  a  seat  with  the  immortal 
champions  of  principle.  It  has  surrounded  Him  with 
the  charm  of  a  seamless  character,  finding  none  like 
Him  in  moral  goodness  in  all  the  catalogue  of  its 
saints.  But  it  has  not  granted  Him  an  inward  impulse 
which  wrought  oblivious  of  the  insinuations  of  sin  and 
akin  only  to  the  essence  of  divinity.  The  two  modes  of 
explaining  Jesus  are  before  our  eyes,  today.  John  and 
the  man  of  culture  struggle  for  the  possession  of  the 
modern  mind,  as  lust  and  truth  struggled  for  the 
soul  of  Faust.  For  myself,  I  do  not  see  a  single 
element  in  the  environment  of  Jesus  that  could  have 
produced  His  life.  Nor  do  I  see  a  single  force  in  His 
nation's  traditions  nor  in  the  complex  sources  of  our 
racial  life  that  could  mark  out  this  soul's  destiny.  He 
appeared  as  a  "  root  out  of  a  dry  ground."  If  life  be 
not  there  already,  the  sterile  soil  "  vj  n  ir^-'aci^tiv  cli- 
mate had  no  power  to  create  ii . 

We  are  impressed,  next,  with  the  fact  that  life  is 
always  complete.  It  is  a  rounded  whole.  The  idea  of 
completeness  is  never  associated  with  a  rock.     The 


174  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

chemical  laws  that  weld  masses  of  matter  into  one 
group  are  ever  the  same.  The  boulder  and  the  beach 
pebble  are  subject  to  the  same  action  in  this  respect. 
But  we  never  speak  of  either  as  being  a  whole.  We 
split  off  a  piece  of  rock,  and  it  is  still  a  rock.  The 
volcano  belches  forth  its  molten  fire,  which  cools  off 
into  solidified  forms,  momentarily  composite,  but  soon 
perhaps  crumbling  into  bits.  We  might  speak  of  the 
solar  system  as  closed  and  hence  complete.  And  yet 
the  relation  of  our  sun  to  a  million  other  suns,  no 
doubt,  affects  its  action  to  a  degree  not  appreciable 
to  us.  But  we  are  perfectly  sure,  when  we  come  to  a 
living  body,  that  it  is  complete  in  itself.  It  cannot 
be  added  to  nor  subtracted  from.  To  be  sure,  you 
might  amputate  a  member  or  destroy  an  organ  without 
changing  the  vital  force,  or,  you  may  reduce  the  vitality 
by  accident  or  disease,  bringing  the  body  very  near  to 
the  marge  of  death.  But  so  long  as  the  spark  of  life 
exists  it  is  complete,  and  may  return  to  its  pristine 
strength.  So  long  as  life  exists,  it  may  re-form  a 
shattered  organ,  as  when  the  eye  in  certain  mollusks  is 
renewed  out  of  the  surrounding  tissue.  But  when  life 
becomes  extinct  no  force  can  retain  the  organic  struc- 
ture in  its  integrity.  It  dissolves,  disintegrates,  and 
disappears  as  a  separate  body. 

We  are  impressed  with  the  spiritual  sufficiency  of 
Christ.  He  is  complete.  He  was  complete  as  an  actor 
on  the  stage  of  human  existence.  Other  men  are  dis- 
tinguished by  excess  or  defect  or  an  unvarnished 
monotony.  Jesus  Christ  evinced  a  balance  which 
secures  for  Him  the  place  of  the  perfect  Man.  Other 
men  made  their  mark  in  thought,  in  action,  in  the 
emphasis  on  a  particular  kind  of  moral  excellence. 
The  Man  of  Nazareth  was  supreme  in  every  depart- 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN      175 

ment.  It  is  extremely  diflScult  to  unite  the  active  and 
passive  qualities  of  character.  The  man  of  action  is 
wont  to  despise  and  deride  the  patient  endurance  of 
the  saint  or  the  cloistered  student.  The  man  of  con- 
templation, on  the  other  hand,  looks  with  good-natured 
indulgence  on  his  neighbor,  who  is  busied  about  many 
things  and  seeks  satisfaction  only  in  practical  results. 
In  Jesus  the  two  phases  of  life  converged.  He  could 
act,  and  with  the  mighty  sword-thrusts  of  an  expe- 
rienced combatant  He  exposed  the  hypocrisy  of  His 
Pharasaic  opponents.  He  could  endure,  and  no  spot 
on  earth  is  so  luminous  with  human  suffering  as  the 
green  hill  without  the  city's  gate.  In  His  own  person, 
then,  He  exhibited  the  completeness  of  life. 

He  stood  for  the  same  comprehensive  grasp  in  His 
teaching.  Some  moralists  have  uncovered  the  dreadful 
sores  of  men's  debility,  but  have  been  powerless  to 
present  a  cure.  Others  have  insisted  vehemently  on 
the  virtues  of  the  remedy  which  they  propose,  though 
they  did  not  know  the  disease.  Jesus  stood  over  against 
both  curse  and  cure,  and  said :  "  Come  unto  me,  and  I 
will  give  you  rest."  He  broke  into  the  craven  heart 
of  the  world,  as  no  other  thinker  did  or  could.  He 
unfolded  the  true  mystery  of  sin.  He  caught  the  fancy 
and  the  instant  faith  of  His  age  by  discrediting  the 
religious  palliatives  in  use, — tithes,  washings,  prayers, 
and  headachy  fasts, — and  by  bringing  their  users  face 
to  face  with  the  doom  of  unpardoned  sin.  And  then, 
when  words  needed  a  lofty  certificate  of  truth,  He 
ascended  the  malefactor's  cross  and  died  for  honor 
and  salvation.  This  is  the  uncut  circle  of  His  teach- 
ing. Its  girth  and  power  He  did  not  hesitate  to  inter- 
pret :  "  As  Moses  lifted  up  the  serpent  in  the  wilderness, 
even  so  must  the  Son  of  man  be  lifted  up;  that  who- 


176  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

soever  believeth  on  him  should  not  perish,  but  have 
everlasting  life."  When  I  think  of  the  persistent  re- 
flections of  earlier  sages,  which  ended  in  fatuity ;  when 
I  read  the  sober,  critical  estimates  of  life  which  were 
conceived  by  the  nobler  men  of  His  own  times,  but 
which  did  not  suggest  to  them  the  most  elementary 
idea  of  conscience;  when  I  see  that  really  earnest 
thinkers  accepted  the  dagger  as  the  best  way  out  of 
a  world,  whose  terms  they  could  not  understand, — then 
I  rejoice,  that  at  last  these  mist-dimmed  eyes  of  men 
see  clearly  the  road  of  life,  and  that  under  the  tuition 
of  a  gracious  Guide  we,  more  safely  than  Dante  by 
Virgil's  side,  scale  the  heights  of  time  and  enter  the 
portals  of  eternity,  to  rest  in  the  bosom  of  our  Lord. 
Such  is  the  completeness  of  His  truth. 

There  is,  again,  completeness  in  His  influence.  Test 
that  statement  by  referring  to  the  universal  application 
of  the  Gospel.  It  is  manifest  that  Judaism  could  in- 
clude but  a  meager  portion  of  the  earth's  population. 
Its  note  was  exclusiveness.  It  is  manifest,  too,  that 
the  several  ethnic  religions  give  a  glint  of  light  here 
and  there,  but  have  in  them  no  quality  that  could  sat- 
isfy the  general  unrest  of  the  soul.  They  do  not  show 
the  real  bitterness  of  sin;  they  do  not  exhibit  the 
undying  love  of  God;  they  cannot  make  us  sure  of  a 
perpetuated  existence  beyond  death;  they  provide  us 
with  no  potent  incentive  to  the  performance  of  duty. 
Now  Christianity  introduces  a  new  factor  into  the 
world.  It  does  not  approach  men  simply  with  a  few 
historical  facts  or  with  a  set  of  doctrines  or  with  an 
emblazoned  ritual,  and  expect  to  win  allegiance  on  the 
basis  of  their  acceptance.  These  glowing  symbols  it 
does  present,  but  only  as  a  support  to  a  deeper  promise. 
It  aflSrms  that  Christ  gives  Life  which  is  applicable  to 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN      177 

every  need.  It  seeks  the  intelligence  of  the  scholar 
and  invites  him  to  submit  his  reason  to  the  touchstone 
of  grace.  It  seeks  the  sodden  inertia  of  ignorance  and 
holds  out  the  beacon  of  hope.  It  will  not  rest,  till  the 
nations  of  the  earth  are  awake  to  the  realization  of 
their  holiest  dreams.  It  believes  that  the  world  is  one 
in  need  and  aspiration,  and  proposes  a  vital  purpose 
which  will  satisfy  both.  If  it  be  objected  that  only 
a  paltry  section  of  mankind  has  as  yet  been  won,  and 
that  not  every  conquest  bears  the  expected  fruit,  still 
it  is  ours  to  answer  that  the  providences  of  God,  like 
the  "  thoughts  of  youth,"  are  long  and  tireless ;  that 
preparation  is  often  the  most  tedious  element  of  action ; 
and  that  in  due  time  the  desired  consummation  will 
arrive.  The  life  of  Christ  is  bound  to  be  complete 
in  the  waiting  hearts  of  men. 

A  third  characteristic  springs  directly  from  what 
we  have  just  said,  namely,  that  life  is  subject  to  devel- 
opment. You  are  familiar  with  the  two  ways  by  which 
an  object  is  enlarged;  the  one  by  addition,  and  the 
next  by  growth.  Here  is  the  crystal,  whose  molecules 
inevitably  form  in  a  six-sided  figure.  You  may  break 
it  and  grind  its  elements  into  powder ;  but  so  strong  is 
its  crystal-principle,  that  the  smallest  parts  will  at 
once  re-form  into  the  same  kind  of  a  figure.  Here, 
again,  is  one  of  those  dainty  bells  of  the  lilies-of-the- 
valley.  You  have  watched  its  growth, — the  seed,  the 
stalk,  the  forming  of  the  bud,  the  unfolding  calyx, 
and  at  length  the  pure,  unstained  flower.  It  has  not 
assumed  its  form  before  your  eyes,  as  the  crystal  did. 
It  has  grown  from  an  inward  power.  If  you  crush  it 
in  your  hand,  you  know  that  the  chemical  devices  of  a 
thousand  laboratories  are  helpless  to  make  it  over. 
The  difference  between  life  and  inert  matter  lies  here. 


178  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

The  one  is  susceptible  of  growth,  its  highest  develop- 
ment being  somehow  secreted  in  the  germ;  the  other 
is  now,  what  it  ever  has  been  and  will  ever  be. 

I  am  touching  on  a  cardinal  truth  in  spiritual  life,  a 
fact  which  has  been  remarked  on  from  the  beginning 
of  Christian  thought.  The  fullness  of  the  divine  power 
did  not  break  on  the  world  in  amazing  grandeur  at 
the  start.  It  grew  apace.  Our  Lord  acted  on  this 
crucial  principle  in  His  treatment  of  the  disciples.  He 
knew  very  well  that  they  could  not  grip  at  once  the 
deep,  heart-searching  doctrines  of  the  new  Evangel. 
"  I  have  many  things  to  say  unto  you,  but  ye  cannot 
bear  them  now."  The  slow,  graduated  declaration  of 
His  religious  precepts  may  strike  us  as  an  unnecessary 
precaution,  when  we  remember  how  the  distinguished 
teachers  of  earth  hurled  the  most  ponderous  themes  at 
their  pupils'  heads.  But  Jesus  was  right.  There  is 
growth  in  thought  as  in  physique.  The  truth  of  re- 
demption as  Paul  learned  it  would  have  been  an  idle 
dream  to  the  fishermen  of  Galilee,  so  long  as  they 
were  in  the  swathing-bands  of  personal  contact  with 
Christ.  It  is  by  a  similar  development  that  the  divine 
Life  has  got  into  the  church.  The  study  of  her  intellec- 
tual story  is  full  of  interest.  She  did  not  grasp  all  at 
once  the  doctrine  of  the  sacred  Trinity ;  she  did  not  see 
at  first  the  meaning  of  a  depraved  and  helpless  state 
by  sin ;  she  had  to  wait  for  the  majestic  theme  of  justi- 
fication, till  Luther  recovered  Paul's  view  of  it  from 
the  corruptions  of  a  medieval  formalism.  It  is  only  in 
modern  times  that  missionary  zeal,  with  the  world  as 
the  rim  of  conquest,  has  truly  interpreted  the  last 
command  of  Jesus.  A  humdrum  program  would  be 
presented  to  the  church,  if  there  were  no  other  intel- 
lectual worlds  to  conquer ;  if  our  doctrine  had  hardened 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN       179 

into  insoluble  dogma  at  the  very  start,  and  we  never 
could  get  a  little  bigger  view  of  Christ.  The  curse  of 
Christian  theology  is  an  ever  renewed  attempt  to  stereo- 
type it.  If  this  creed  is  the  last  word  to  be  said  on 
truth,  then  we  may  as  well  withdraw  our  faith  in  it; 
it  is  doomed  to  die.  Life  requires  expansion  for  re- 
ligion, as  well  as  nature.  Shut  up  the  church  to  an 
ancient  formulary,  and  you  will  cramp  her  spiritual 
energies,  exhaust  her  ambition,  and  render  her  as 
hopeless  as  the  Oriental  bodies,  which  have  "  a  name  to 
live  but  are  dead." 

II 

We  take  up  the  second  part  of  our  subject,  that 
spiritual  life  is  not  original  with  men.  It  seems  to  us 
a  truism,  and  we  wonder  who  could  possibly  deny  it. 
But  the  pride  or  the  self-consciousness  of  men  has 
denied  it,  and  is  doing  so  today.  We  are  as  men 
enamored  of  our  achievements.  We  have  produced 
about  everything  in  sight,  and  fall  back  on  the  con- 
viction that  we  must  have  furbished  up  our  religious 
natures,  too.  It  will  not  be  denied  that  the  genius  of 
great  minds  is  one  of  the  remarkable  factors  in  human 
progress.  No  one  can  study  the  discoveries  and  inven- 
tions in  every  sphere  of  activity  and  thought  without 
being  infected  with  admiration  for  the  ability  dis- 
played. No  one  can  follow  the  course  of  political 
struggle  by  which  the  race  has  been  lifted  from  impo- 
tence to  the  civilized  standards  wc  now.  acknowledge, 
and  not  be  profoundly  impressed  by  the  stern  assertion 
of  human  will.  We  have  done  marvelous  things.  But 
the  very  instruments  men  have  used  for  achieving 
great  results  are  given,  not  made.  The  beaver  has  his 
tools  fastened  to  his  body ;  they  belong  to  the  organism. 


180  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Man  makes  the  tools  for  economic  service;  but  the 
crowning  intelligence  which  creates  these  tools  is  in 
its  turn  not  made,  but  a  part  of  his  heritage.  Life  is 
born  of  life,  or  not  at  all. 

The  first  application  of  the  principle  in  spiritual 
things  is,  that  man  by  nature  has  not  a  single  power 
which  resembles  the  divine  life,  we  have  described.  He 
cannot  therefore  make  his  soul  into  the  likeness  of 
truth.  For  what  could  for  a  moment  be  regarded  as 
on  a  level  with  the  life  which  is  conveyed  by  Christ? 
I  examine  the  common  emotions  of  the  race.  They  are 
full  of  natural  beauty,  ofttimes.  Here  is  the  sentiment 
of  maternal  affection,  a  mother's  love  for  her  babe,  a 
protecting  force,  that  shelters  it  from  every  ill,  and 
prompts  the  parent  to  accept  death  rather  than  allow 
a  hair  of  its  head  to  fall.  The  affection  is  noble.  After 
we  have  viewed  the  baseness  of  life  to  which  some 
parents  descend  it  passes  our  comprehension  how  so 
glorious  a  sentiment  as  this  can  persist.  Here  is  the 
love  of  truth,  the  willingness  of  a  soul  to  pass  through 
the  fires  in  support  of  it.  When  Roger  Bacon  spent 
years  in  prison,  because  he  taught  scientific  doctrines 
abhorrent  to  the  interests  of  the  church,  we  see  a  noble 
soul,  undismayed  by  torture,  alive  to  the  thoughts  of 
God.  These  are  matchless  qualities,  and  we  rejoice 
that  the  frail  frame  of  man  may  support  them.  But 
we  ask,  Do  they  reach  up  to  the  zenith  of  life,  the  ex- 
alted standard  set  by  our  Lord?  Henry  Drummond 
has  drawn  out  an  interesting  parallel.  He  likens  the 
moral  beauty  of  the  non-Christian  to  the  severe  and 
glistening  facets  of  the  crystal ;  and  the  beauty  of  spirit 
in  the  Christian  to  the  smooth  charm  of  the  shell  on 
the  beach.  Both  invite  the  attention  of  observers,  and 
both  win  our  esteem.    But  can  we  assess  the  value  of 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN       181 

each  by  studying  simply  the  surface?  There  is  a 
fundamental  difference,  which  a  superficial  examination 
does  not  reveal.  The  two  objects  do  not  belong  to  the 
same  kingdom.  The  one  is  composed  of  dead,  unor- 
ganized matter,  the  other  is  instinct  with  life. 

The  Edinburgh  professor  has  put  his  finger  on  an 
important  distinction.  He  has  seized  the  two  great 
forms  of  personal  excellence  and  divided  sharply  be- 
tween them.  Morality  can  be  made  a  pungent  force  and 
a  luminous  shape  in  the  councils  of  earth.  It  can 
crystallize  the  rules  of  a  high  code  of  honor.  It  can 
take  an  Aristides  and  embellish  his  career  with  the 
lines  of  stern  rectitude  and  impartial  justice.  It  is 
steadfast,  valiant,  unyielding.  But  Christian  character 
is  vibrant  with  a  divine  discontent;  it  seeks  a  holier 
model  and  a  finer  fiber.  It  craves  not  regularity  of  sen- 
timent, but  a  vision  of  God,  To  erect  a  state  in  which 
uniform  conduct  were  possible  was  the  ideal  of  Hellas. 
To  erect  an  invisible  kingdom,  in  which  souls  entered 
the  presence  of  God,  was  and  is  the  aim  of  Jesus  Christ. 
In  other  words,  spiritual  beauty  is  determined  by  our 
attitude  towards  God.  Hebrew  thinkers  divided  the 
world  into  the  two  groups,  only  two, — "  nations  which 
knew  God,"  and  "  nations  which  knew  not  God."  There 
is  no  neutral  ground.  The  former  may  disclose  certain 
elements  of  formal  beauty  that  enchant  the  casual 
inquirer.  The  latter,  at  times,  are  so  barren  of  ethical 
ideals  as  to  stun  the  believer  and  draw  the  ridicule  of 
foes.  '  But  however  that  may  be,  the  difference  is  de- 
cisive; it  consists  in  the  fact  that  God  has  visited  and 
charged  the  hearts  of  men,  put  His  life  into  theirs,  and 
made  them  sensible  of  His  power  as  other  men  can 
never  be.  The  difference  grows  chasm-deep,  as  we 
realize  that  moral  beauty  has  little  ability  to  transmit 


182  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

itself.  How  many  men  of  Socrates'  fellowship  were 
lured  to  emulation  by  his  noble  death?  But  myriads, 
athrill  with  the  divine  life  that  Jesus  gives,  have  laid 
down  reputation,  goods,  family,  and  life  for  the 
Gospel! 

Yet  if  nature  cannot  create  spiritual  power,  she 
nevertheless  can  become  the  channel  for  its  currents' 
flow.  Let  us  take  a  leaf  out  of  her  own  book,  a  page  of 
unusual  beauty.  Life  cannot  issue  from  inert  matter, 
but  life  can  take  up  such  matter  into  her  organisms 
and  derive  her  strength  from  its  elements.  Do  you  ask 
how  the  lifeless  soil  becomes  a  beautiful  flower?  Watch 
that  dull,  dark  clod  of  earth,  unattractive  and  unfit  for 
use.  Into  it  a  seed  is  dropped  and  reposes  unseen 
there.  Soon,  warmed  by  the  earth  and  fed  by  the 
moisture  it  opens  its  integument,  sends  out  its  sprout, 
lifts  its  stem  to  the  light,  takes  in  the  chemical  elements 
of  the  atmosphere,  grows,  thrives,  comes  to  maturity, 
begins  to  hope  for  perpetuity,  unfolds  in  the  white 
bloom  of  the  lily,  drops  its  seeds,  which  are  to  repeat 
its  service, — in  short,  transmutes  the  power  of  inert 
matter  into  the  beauty  of  its  flower.  Thus  can  life 
employ  the  lifeless  substance  about  it. 

The  analogy  is  close.  Into  the  crevices  of  the  heart 
the  subtle  life  of  heaven  is  dropped.  It  comes,  we  know 
not  how,  and  often,  we  know  not  when;  but  come  it 
does,  in  gushing,  transforming  power.  It  takes  the 
crabbed  disposition  and  makes  it  into  a  golden  song. 
It  takes  an  empty  purpose  and  fills  it  with  a  rich  con- 
geries of  holy  ambitions.  It  seizes  a  strong  nature, 
going  to  waste,  and  girds  it  with  a  powerful  ideal. 
Once  it  was  Saul,  exercised  over  the  trivial  matters  of 
the  law;  now  it  is  Paul,  energized  with  a  cosmic  sym- 
pathy.   Once  he  was  a  Jew,  exclusive,  reactionary,  and 


LIFE  NOT  ORIGINAL  WITH  MAN       183 

bitter;  now  he  is  the  flaming  Apostle,  winging  his  way 
to  the  hopeless  men  of  earth  with  a  message  of  eternal 
life.  Matthew  Arnold  thought  of  religion  as  "  morality, 
touched  with  emotion."  He  got  his  terms  dislocated. 
Religion  is  the  heart's  emotion,  evincing  itself  in  a  con- 
secrated morality.  Religion  grips  morality.  Life  takes 
up  the  unorganized  masses  of  earth  into  its  crucible 
and  absorbs  them.  In  the  order  of  the  created  world, 
that  which  is  natural  is  first,  and  "  afterwards  that 
which  is  spiritual."  But  in  the  realm  of  grace  spirit 
is  seated  on  the  throne,  and  to  it  the  natural  powers  of 
men  must  inevitably  bow.  Christ  is  the  reservoir  from 
which  peace  and  safety  are  drawn.  Without  Him,  you 
may  lead  a  life  of  natural,  that  is  to  say,  moral  excel- 
lence ;  but  you  will  miss  the  deep,  serene,  unchangeable 
communion  with  the  Spirit  of  goodness,  mercy,  and 
truth. 

We  come  to  the  close  of  this  study  with  a  remark 
on  the  assurance,  conveyed  by  the  text.  Men  crave  for 
life,  as  for  nothing  else  on  earth.  This  is  what  makes 
the  problem  so  fascinating,  and  the  same  time  so 
complex.  We  get  no  guaranty  like  this  in  the  vitalities 
of  the  world.  If  a  physician  should  arise  possessing  the 
faculty  of  communicating  life  by  his  touch,  his  practice 
would  soon  exhaust  his  personal  strength.  If  an  exper- 
imenter should  appear  to  answer  all  the  queries  that 
now  trouble  the  learned  world,  how  soon  would  reso- 
lutions of  praise  and  delight  be  engrossed  on  the  books 
of  every  scientific  society!  If  a  moralist  should  arrive, 
who  could  tell  you  how  to  act  in  every  possible  con- 
tingency, I  take  it,  we  should  soon  create  an  Utopian 
state.  If  some  day  a  preacher  should  ascend  the  pulpit 
stairs  with  a  divine  charm  of  speech  and  manner,  and 
be  able  to  persuade  the  church  to  follow  rigorously 


184  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  rules  laid  down  by  Jesus,  the  probability  is  that 
both  ministry  and  church  would  speedily  become  super- 
fluous ;  the  millennium  would  be  here. 

But  these  suppositions  are  idle.  We  do  not  expect 
a  personal  effusion  like  this.  Yet  the  very  thing  of 
which  we  have  spoken  is  already  within  the  grasp  of 
men.  The  life  of  heaven  is  now  on  this  earth.  It 
became  a  distinct  fact  on  the  day  of  Pentecost.  It  is 
supported  by  the  known  laws  of  psychic  exchange; 
that  is,  the  soul  of  man  is  susceptible  to  the  secret  in- 
fluence, which  we  call  the  work  of  the  divine  Spirit. 
It  has  been  affirmed  a  thousand  times  in  the  move- 
ments of  the  church.  It  is  found  in  many  an  obscure 
heart,  which  the  world  counts  insignificant,  but  which 
is  in  reality  the  focal  point  of  eternal  power.  We  may 
live — we  shall  live,  because  the  divine  Son  lives  in  us. 
This  is  the  confidence  not  to  be  disturbed.  You  may 
not  be  able  to  define  such  life  in  logical  terms;  you 
may  not  be  able  to  reveal  its  true  meaning  to  men ;  but 
this  you  can  do: — when  the  shadows  begin  to  gather 
before  your  eyes  and  the  energies  of  body  ebb  away, 
then  you  may  sink  your  anchor  deep  into  the  unfath- 
omable heart  of  your  Lord  and  wait  for  the  revelation 
of  the  endless  Life,  which  you  are  to  share  with  Him 
in  heaven. 


XII 
LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE 

John  14 -'21.  "He  that  hath  my  com- 
mandments and  keepeth  them,  he  it  is  that 
loveth  me." 

WHAT  is  love?  The  query  is  borne  hither  on 
the  wings  of  distant  fancy.  The  maid  of 
Athens  flushed  with  the  joy  of  the  first 
avowal  finds  a  sufficient  answer  in  her  own  breast.  The 
youth  of  the  new  world  standing  abashed  before  the 
object  of  his  interest  spurns  analysis  by  the  rules  of 
logic,  and  reads  his  definition  in  the  gleam  of  the 
eye,  the  clasp  of  the  hand,  or  the  low-uttered  word  of 
assent.  Love  as  a  sentiment  binds  a  credulous  antiq- 
uity heart  and  soul  to  the  scientific  formulas  of  the 
latest  experience.  Love  will  not  change.  The  ideas  of 
organized  society  melt  into  a  thousand  unsuspected 
moulds.  The  creeds  of  religion  and  her  elaborate  rit- 
uals have  been  chiseled  by  time  into  finished  forms  such 
as  fascinate  the  mind  and  seal  the  faith  of  multitudes. 
Love  moves  on  unchallenged.  Her  pristine  values  are 
re-interpreted  in  terms  of  enlarging  knowledge  but  as 
the  sanctuary  of  man  and  God  she  defies  all  change. 
The  dirge  of  Hector's  consort  celebrating  her  deathless 
devotion  is  echoed  in  ten  thousand  shadowed  homes 
today.  The  solitary  hymn  of  the  desert  saint  as  he 
lifts  his  fainting  soul  into  communion  with  the  Unseen 
typifies  the  melodic  intonation  of  all  humble  wor- 
shippers who  for  a  few  short  hours  retreat  to  the 

185 


186  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

shrines  of  religion,  away  from  the  crush  of  busy  marts, 
the  clash  of  brilliant  intellects  and  even  from  the 
thunder  of  murderous  Krupp  and  Creusot. 

What  is  love,  this  imaging  impulse,  this  human  fact 
that  Jesus  makes  central  to  His  scheme  of  life?  To  lay 
hold  upon  the  commandments  of  grace  and  keep  them 
as  the  sole  dynamic  of  conduct — this  is  the  program  of 
love. 


Love  is  a  property  of  nature.  It  is  bone  of  our  bone 
and  flesh  of  our  flesh.  If  men  had  to  wait  for  sects  or 
sages  to  unfold  its  terms,  very  few  of  us  would  learn 
even  the  primary  syllables  of  human  affection.  In- 
struction, however,  is  simple.  To  live  is  to  love.  The 
avenues  of  biologic  progress  teem  with  its  spontaneous 
characters.  Yonder  radiant  thrush  soaring  aloft  in 
glad  song,  careless  of  wind  or  rain,  proclaims  at  once 
his  mission  and  his  goal.  He  seeks  in  passionate  aban- 
don his  appointed  mate.  It  is  the  witness  of  nature  to 
her  divine  law.  The  suspicious  lioness  in  the  jungle 
secretes  her  young  in  the  silent  dark  away  from  the 
devouring  jaws  of  the  enemy,  obeying  the  instinct  of 
love,  which,  tenacious  amid  enveloping  perils,  instructs 
the  unreflective  brute  to  shield  her  own  against  im- 
pending death.  The  pathway  up  the  steep  heights  of 
animal  evolution  is  strewn  with  tokens  that  seem  at 
times  to  interpret  the  sentiments  of  a  cultured  race. 

What  then  is  love?  It  is  first  of  all  a  native  law. 
The  man  of  facts  can  never  expunge  it  from  his  life- 
book.  If  he  did,  he  would  have  to  erase  every  signifi- 
cant page,  and  reduce  his  history  to  a  myth.  Try,  for 
example,  to  write  off  the  myriad  incidents  that  chron- 
icle the  embrace  of  mother-love.     To  go  no  further 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  187 

afield  than  the  personal  implications  of  this  verse: 
how  shall  we  explain  the  primary  currents  of  Jesus' 
life,  if  we  cannot  define  the  undertones  of  affection 
sounding  in  His  and  Mary's  heart?  The  Evangelists 
have  been  blamed  for  offering  so  scant  a  memoir  of  the 
Nazareth  home.  Censorious  readers  have  chided  Jesus 
for  an  apparent  neglect  of  kinsmen  in  His  public  min- 
istrations. The  truth  lies  in  neither  complaint.  Bar- 
ring the  mystery  of  the  sacred  Birtu,  "^e  are  con- 
fronted with  a  number  of  simple  human  passages.  The 
remonstrating  mother  at  the  first  Passover,  "  Son,  why 
hast  thou  dealt  thus  with  us?",  the  anxious  group  on 
the  edge  of  the  throng,  sending  a  message  of  caution  to 
the  tireless  Teacher,  the  crushed  and  weeping  woman 
beneath  Calvary's  shadow,  whom  John  is  to  receive 
from  her  Son's  hands  as  a  perpetual  charge, — can  one 
inspect  these  if  only  for  a  moment  without  being  moved 
by  the  insatiate  passion  of  face  and  voice,  nature's 
cry  for  her  own? 

What  is  love?  This  is  love,  to  give  place  to  the 
drive  of  nature,  to  have  and  to  hold  whatever  wisdom 
has  provided  for  the  culture  of  mind  and  body.  From 
this  point  of  view  I  read  the  exquisite  lyric  of  David 
and  Jonathan.  Two  men  meet  in  the  prime  of  powers, 
their  hearts  not  yet  wasted  by  the  sheer  despair  of 
evaporated  effort,  their  memories  not  yet  so  crowded 
with  achievements  as  to  find  no  place  for  friendly  sup- 
port. The  quiet  reserve  of  the  one,  the  impulsive  dash 
of  the  other,  constitute  the  two  poles  of  a  magnetic 
field.  Neither  attracts  its  like ;  they  must  be  reciprocal, 
they  must  supplement.  Love  is  fundamentally  the  re- 
sponse of  want.  It  is  the  reaction  to  what  can  serve 
the  individual's  vital  interests. 

In  a  feeling  not  dissimilar  to  this,  I  discover  the 


188  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

gropings  of  men  towards  a  spiritual  hope.  It  is  folly 
to  contend  that  the  impulse  of  religion  fell  upon  the 
race  as  an  afterthought.  He  who  argues  this  is  only 
repeating  the  Protagorean  myth  as  to  the  origin  of 
political  virtue.  Can  the  mirage  of  ghosts  and  the 
visioned  reappearance  of  departed  ancestors  force  us 
at  length  to  react  to  the  idea  of  superhuman  control? 
Do  we  affirm  that  religion  has  sprung  from  the  mis- 
judgment  of  a  stampeded  fancy?  that  men  bow  and 
worship,  because  they  are  wrought  upon  by  an  exag- 
gerated fear?  that  if  dreams  or  sudden  fright  had  not 
exposed  the  incredible  weakness  of  our  position,  we 
should  still  be  swathed  in  the  pristine  innocence  of 
heart,  afar  from  blazing  altar  or  threaded  rosary? 
That  terror  is  real  both  to  confiding  child  and  awakened 
man,  I  should  be  the  last  to  deny.  Nor  is  the  cry  for 
relief  less  real.  They  go  together.  But  fear  does  not 
create  a  religious  impulse;  it  simply  furnishes  a 
channel  through  which  that  impulse  moves  to  its  nor- 
mal expression.  Hence  religion  is  human  need  writ 
large.  It  is  another  name  for  the  primitive  feeling 
which  in  the  more  public  phases  of  life  we  have  called 
love.  It  belongs  to  the  frame  of  the  soul ;  it  is  not  the 
by-product  of  social  change.  If  God  be  not  somewhere 
within  the  field  of  spiritual  reaction,  the  higher  in- 
stincts of  life  atrophy  and  die;  hope  becomes  the 
shadow  of  a  dream,  and  the  world  the  ghastly  shimmer 
of  death. 

But  the  warm  response  which  has  animated  every 
inferior  relation  cannot  be  denied  its  part  in  the  high 
program  of  a  soul's  canonization.  Love  here,  as  else- 
where, is  organic.  It  leaps  in  the  blood;  it  fills  the 
meshes  of  the  mind ;  it  prints  its  language  on  the  brow, 
and  thrills  in  every  gesture  of  the  body.    Religious  love 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  189 

is  varied;  it  may  evince  itself  in  the  studied  calm  of 
the  Buddha  or  in  the  fivefold  prostrations  of  the  Mos- 
lem. But  whatever  its  forms  it  cannot  remain 
unuttered.  To  man,  to  principle,  to  God,  the  insinu- 
ations of  love  are  coercive.  We  are  compelled  to  love 
something.  The  will  of  man  courts  sure  and  swift 
defeat,  if  it  strives  to  block  the  instinct's  march  to  its 
goal.  Therefore,  it  is  not  the  business  of  religion  to 
determine  whether  love  exists.  Psychology  has  already 
done  that.  The  business  of  religion  is  supplementary ; 
it  must  determine  with  authority  upon  what  object  love 
shall  rest.  The  choice  of  one's  religious  faith  is  as 
much  a  matter  of  personal  discrimination  as  a  man's 
selection  of  a  wife.  Pay  your  respects  to  the  maxim 
that  "  true  marriages  are  made  in  heaven."  They  are ; 
but  how?  In  the  sense  that  the  agent  is  gifted  with 
the  primordial  right  to  choose  for  himself.  The  im- 
pulse which  goads  a  man  to  leave  his  parents  and 
establish  a  home  for  himself  is  inbred  in  the  race.  Its 
particular  direction  is  subject  always  to  the  behest  of 
the  parties  involved. 

Love  is  thus  not  merely  organic.  It  is  critically 
directed.  It  must  be,  in  order  to  measure  up  to  the 
feeling  exacted  by  Jesus  of  His  followers.  The  word 
He  uses  in  the  text  makes  that  point  clear.  Peter  and 
John  resort  to  Him  under  the  instigation  of  a  maturer 
motive  than  obedience  to  impulse.  The  emotional  in- 
quirer, to  be  sure,  was  not  absent  from  His  clientele. 
In  the  heat  of  a  momentary  resolution,  one  hearer  ex- 
claims, "Lord,  I  will  follow  thee  whithersoever  thou 
goest."  But  Jesus  answers,  the  home  and  hearthstone, 
the  place  of  warmth  and  cheery  talk  are  none  of  His. 
If  anyone  sought  Him  to  satisfy  the  common  emotions 
of  life,  his  quest  was  vain.    Personal  enthusiasm  be- 


190  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

gotten  by  love  is  a  valued  asset  in  the  counsels  of  the 
world.  The  holy  Master,  as  human  as  another,  did  not 
despise  it.  Many  a  time,  as  amid  the  shadows  of 
Gethsemane,  He  yearned  for  the  embrace  of  sym- 
pathetic comrades.  But  love  which  envisages  faith  is 
after  all  a  fact  of  reason.  Paul  came  to  Christ  having 
made,  I  suppose,  the  severest  examination  of  religious 
concepts  ever  attempted  by  human  mind.  The  creed 
of  the  Rabbins  was  not  an  unorganized  mass  of  opin- 
ions, as  is  commonly  believed;  it  was  an  articulate 
scheme  of  thought,  entirely  congenial  to  the  trained 
intellect  of  Paul  and  Philo.  Through  this  the  young 
student  passed  unsatisfied.  He  sought  an  end  beyond 
it.  To  reach  the  end,  he  had  to  exercise  the  instru- 
ments of  intellectual  choice.  No  blind  untutored 
thrust  could  win  it.  Why  did  Paul  come  to  Jesus? 
Why  did  this  man  of  cold  logic  with  the  pessimism  of 
Greek  culture  on  his  lips  rise  to  the  empyrean  glow  of 
love,  as  soon  as  he  touched  the  person  of  Christ? 

To  answer  for  Paul  is  to  answer  for  the  men  of 
power  today.  Paul  did  not  come  to  Jesus  by  the  lure 
of  another's  witness.  I  do  not  undervalue  the  effect 
of  trenchant  testimony.  Its  radiant  beauty  and  oft- 
times  its  tragic  consequences  are  emphatic  in  the  pan- 
orama of  human  life.  Multitudes  of  believers  owe  their 
first  step  in  the  Christian  faith  to  the  ingratiating 
word  of  a  neighbor.  History  does  not  tell  but  the 
imagination  loves  to  conjecture  how  many  units  in  the 
young  Pharisee's  creed  were  written  by  the  unflinching 
death  of  Stephen.  Nevertheless,  it  was  not  the  blood 
of  the  first  Martyr  that  awoke  the  sleeping  conscience. 
Nor  did  Paul  resort  to  Christ,  because  he  was  elec- 
trified by  the  enmiracled  life  of  the  Lord.  He  does  not 
endeavor  to  define  a  miracle;  he  fails  to  state  what 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  191 

part  it  should  play  in  the  scheme  of  Christian  evi- 
dence. The  "  mighty  works "  of  Galilee  and  Judea 
are  unremembered  in  his  writings.  Alone  of  all  the 
mystifying  scenes  in  an  unique  career  the  empty  tomb 
commanded  his  wondering  inquest.  Because  from  the 
precincts  of  death  the  basic  principle  of  life  was  drawn, 
his  pages  shine  with  the  luminous  syllables  of  con- 
Tiction.  That  Jesus  healed  the  sick  and  discharged  the 
mind  of  its  "  rooted  sorrows,"  he  knew  as  well  as  the 
most  authentic  eyewitness.  Deeds  like  these  are  the 
marks  of  His  divinity  and  essential  to  the  appreciation 
of  His  worth;  but  they  could  not  coax  the  embittered 
soul  from  its  love  of  sin.  Men  do  not  perform  an  act 
of  faith  under  the  spell  of  a  laboratory  experiment. 

But  perhaps  Paul  came  to  Jesus  as  a  dernier  ressort. 
With  the  utmost  candor  he  had  weighed  the  two  pre- 
vailing schemes  of  thought  and  found  them  wanting. 
The  religious  impulse  must  react  to  some  person  or 
thing.  Therefore  he  chose  the  latest  claimant.  By 
such  a  method  of  elimination  Peter  may  have  found  his 
Master.  "  To  whom  shall  we  go?  "  he  cried.  "Gamaliel 
and  Hillel  present  systems  of  doctrine  cogent  in  lan- 
guage, attested  by  a  wealth  of  tradition,  interpreted 
by  the  ablest  scholars  of  the  day.  Yet  they  yield  no 
meaning  to  the  hungry  heart.  They  have  words,  with- 
ered words,  words  of  deadly  uniformity.  Thou  only 
hast  the  words  of  eternal  life."  Every  decision  for 
Christ  is  the  residual  deposit  of  an  eliminating  process. 
We  believe,  not  because  we  have  found  other  orders  of 
thought  defective,  but  because  we  have  found  His 
true.  If  any  man  bestows  his  affection  on  Christ  in 
sheer  desperation  after  earlier  objects  of  trust  have 
failed  and  with  no  just  understanding  of  His  cardinal 
merits,  I  predict  for  his  passion  a  short  shrift  and  a 


192  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

speedy  decay.  This  Lord  is  like  the  monarch  of  earth 
— He  wants  the  steady,  chastened  love  of  mature  re- 
flection, or  none  at  all.  For  reasons  such  as  these, 
Paul  did  not  cast  his  spiritual  anchorage  by  the  cross 
of  Calvary  as  though  it  were  the  last  unswept  mooring. 
He  approached  it  in  the  swell  of  a  man's  conviction. 
He  conceived  for  Christ  that  loyal  love,  which  a  man  is 
careful  to  repose  in  the  object  of  his  dearest  interest. 
He  embraced  the  cause  of  a  despised  religion  because 
reason  made  the  stupefying  discovery  that  spiritual 
safety  is  the  gift  of  God  and  not  the  product  of  cere- 
monial diligence. 

What  is  love?  I  return  to  our  first  question  but 
garnish  it  with  a  new  implication.  What  is  love  to 
Christ?  The  impulse  now  becomes  a  program.  It  is 
no  longer  spent  upon  the  common  habitudes  of  sense; 
it  has  crept  into  the  secrecies  of  spirit.  Love  is  in- 
stant answer  to  the  call  of  Supernature.  Its  quintes- 
sence is  distilled  before  the  gaze  of  an  astonished  world 
in  the  act  of  holy  sacrifice.  Early  Greek  philosophy 
found  the  spheres  wrapped  in  the  harmonies  of  con- 
current action.  Modern  poets  have  read  in  the  New- 
tonian formula  the  same  cosmic  affection.  Fancy  has 
construed  the  terms  of  matter  by  the  sublime  imagery 
of  the  mind.  There  are  invaluable  hints  to  be  gained 
from  the  words  of  science.  Centripetal  force  is  real, 
the  coherence  of  chemical  elements  is  real;  but  the 
love  of  Christ  is  real  in  another  sense.  The  love  of  His 
touch  has  passed  from  the  moods  of  theoretic  specula- 
tion into  the  judgments  and  convictions  of  strong  men. 
The  blood  of  heroes  plunges  through  its  veins. 

Anatole  France  has  misconceived  the  essence  of 
Christian  sentiment.  The  monk  of  "  Thais  "  cannot 
endure  the  moral  stagnations  of  solitude.     Love  is 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  195 

empty,  the  stream  of  personal  friendship  shallow. 
Shall  nature's  instincts  go  unappeased,  if  religion  fail 
to  satisfy  ?  He  turns  for  answer  to  the  brilliant  artiste 
whom  his  zeal  has  erstwhile  converted.  Human  pas- 
sion meets  its  fulfillment  in  the  appeal  to  sense  and  in 
no  other  way.  This  is  the  judgment  of  the  French 
author.  Is  the  analysis  true?  Is  uncriticized  impulse 
the  sole  arbiter  of  men's  fortunes?  Christianity  does 
not  fling  aside  the  familiar  values  of  life.  Paternal 
care,  filial  regard,  the  love  of  man  to  woman,  the  re- 
sponse of  the  eye  to  beauty  and  of  the  ear  to  melody, 
are  never  appraised  as  inconsistent  with  loyalty  to 
truth.  But  love,  says  the  Christian  ethic,  shapes  its 
course  by  judgment;  otherwise  it  is  little  better  than 
the  impulse  of  the  brute.  Therefore  it  proposes  a 
supreme  direction.  It  unveils  an  infinitely  glorious 
Face,  Thais  and  Christ  are  the  poles  of  love.  If  you 
love  the  one  the  other  is  perforce  disesteemed.  But  if 
you  love  the  holy  Master,  your  passion  for  other  objects 
is  not  annulled,  but  strangely  changed.  The  world 
you  enter  is  ablaze  with  splendors  hitherto  unsuspected. 
All  the  ancient  relationships  are  charged  as  by  a 
magic  energy.  You  are  a  better  father,  a  more  con- 
siderate husband,  a  wiser  citizen,  because  you  have 
caught  some  glint  of  the  grace  of  Christ.  Love  like 
this  is  alien  from  the  conceit  of  the  French  skeptic. 
He  has  not  even  amid  his  dreams  spun  the  first  ten- 
uous strand  in  the  fabric  of  Christian  character.  The 
confessions  of  Saint  John  are  to  him  a  mystic  trans- 
port. Jesus  is  a  noble  but  mistaken  teacher.  There  is 
no  goal  but  flesh. 


194.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 


II 


Against  this  verdict  we  set  up  the  deliverance  of  the 
text,  ''  He  that  hath  my  commandments  and  keepeth 
them,  he  it  is  that  loveth  me."  The  test  of  natural 
love  is  intensity.  The  test  of  reflective  love  is  fidelity. 
The  difference  between  them  is  fundamental.  How 
shall  I  measure  the  force  of  an  emotion?  I  may  ex- 
amine the  driving  instinct  itself.  No  man,  for  example, 
is  willing  to  live  alone.  He  grows  uneasy,  restless,  and 
morbid.  Loneliness  aflflrms  that  a  certain  impulse  has 
been  thwarted.  A  man  is  not  a  whole  man  until  he 
has  had  converse  with  his  neighbor.  But  which  neigh- 
bor? For  the  meaning  of  instinct  can  often  be  in- 
terpreted best  by  the  type  of  stimulus  to  which  it 
responds.  Yet  even  here  the  test  is  not  complete. 
What  is  the  quality  of  the  pleasure  I  feel  in  the  pres- 
ence of  chosen  friends?  That  quality  alone  can  yield 
the  sure  and  ultimate  ground  of  judgment.  That  is  to 
say,  the  test  is  personal.  It  comes  back  ever  and 
anon  to  my  private  enjoyment. 

Do  we  test  the  love  of  the  spirit  in  such  a  crucible? 
The  symptoms  of  ordinary  affection,  we  say,  are 
subject  to  scientific  examination.  We  may  take  our 
feelings  to  the  laboratory  and  have  them  assessed. 
Can  we  do  the  same  for  our  religious  hopes?  I  answer: 
No.  But  why  not?  If  love  to  God  and  love  to  man  be 
on  the  same  footing,  as  some  thinkers  hold,  why  should 
we  not  judge  them  by  the  same  method?  The  retort  is, 
that  an  idea  has  entered,  which  is  represented  by  no 
particular  impression  of  the  body.  That  idea  is  a 
purpose.  It  is  not  a  passing  act;  it  is  the  principle 
that  explains  my  conduct  as  a  whole.  Love  has  gotten 
beyond  the  need  of  momentary  gratification.    It  seeks 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  195 

the  expanse  of  life;  it  knows  now  that  come  what  may 
it  must  and  shall  be  faithful  to  a  supreme  truth.  Its 
tests  appear,  not  as  a  matter  of  private  exaltation,  as 
the  mystics  claim,  but  as  a  steady  indomitable  effort 
of  will.  The  alembic  into  which  it  is  cast  is  the  fact  of 
experience.  The  chemicals  that  try  its  value  are  the 
commands  of  Christ.  Hence,  Peter  is  not  beside  the 
mark  when  he  exclaims,  "  The  trying  of  your  faith, 
being  of  much  greater  worth  than  that  of  gold,  even 
when  it  is  tried  by  fire,  issues  in  praise  and  honor  and 
glory  at  the  appearing  of  Jesus  Christ." 

You  can  test  the  virtue  of  your  love  by  seeing  how 
it  behaves  in  solution.  The  solution  proposed,  I  said, 
is  the  evangelic  commandment.  The  first  effect  of  this 
treatment  is  to  make  bare  the  individual  responsibility 
of  the  agent.  To  carry  out  the  mission  of  love  one  is 
not  expected  to  obey  indiscriminately  a  series  of  pre- 
cepts. Christ  does  not,  like  the  Rabbins,  issue  a 
catalogue  of  rules.  He  exhales  the  spirit  of  law.  He 
does  not  exact  from  His  subjects  a  blind  surrender  of 
will;  He  demands  that  they  think  for  themselves  in 
every  spiritual  emergency.  His  government  is  not  a 
moral  mechanism.  He  does  not  conceive  of  His  dis- 
ciples as  so  fixed  in  His  body,  the  church,  that  they 
automatically  obey  the  direction  of  the  head.  The 
difference  between  His  rule  and  the  arbitrary  rule  of 
Rabbinism  is  the  same  as  that  between  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  and  Teutonic  ideas  of  the  State.  For  us  in 
America  the  State  does  not  absorb  its  citizens.  They 
constitute  and  direct  the  State.  German  thinkers  like 
Hegel  have  engulfed  the  individual  in  the  currents  of 
government,  meaning  the  government  classes.  The 
mind  of  each  is  the  mind  of  all;  there  is  no  moral 
sense  save  that  which  interprets  the  State's  integrity. 


196  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Jesus,  on  the  other  hand,  recognizes  my  right,  as  a 
man,  to  study  and  apply  the  principle  He  has  formu- 
lated. When  He  commands  us  to  meet  an  affront  on 
one  cheek  by  turning  the  other,  He  is  as  far  as  possible 
from  asking  a  literal,  unqualified  compliance.  Resist- 
ance to  wrong  no  less  than  repression  of  self  is  an 
effective  motive  in  Christian  conduct.  The  point  is 
that  I,  a  believer  in  the  lordship  of  Christ,  am  forced 
to  exercise  my  private  wisdom  in  determining  what 
answer  is  best  in  any  given  circumstances. 

In  face  of  such  an  appeal  to  judgment,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  re-examine  our  spiritual  attitudes.  The  test  I 
take  it  is  twofold.  It  concerns,  first,  the  understanding 
of  truth,  and  secondly,  the  shaping  of  conduct.  The 
easiest  way  to  deal  with  the  words  of  Jesus  is  to 
organize  them  into  a  system.  We  act  by  this  method 
in  the  field  of  philosophy ;  we  venture  to  treat  thus  the 
cinemetograms  of  science.  The  method  is  simple.  Lay 
out  the  program  of  logical  sequences  as  you  make  a 
survey  for  a  railway;  then  bring  in  the  ballast,  the 
supports,  the  steel  bessemers,  that  is  to  say,  the  con- 
trolling principles,  the  wise  sayings,  the  vital  sentences, 
wrenched  if  need  be  from  their  context;  fit  them  into 
the  designated  plan,  and  you  have  a  creed  which  neither 
argument  nor  innuendo  can  destroy.  You  are  safe  in 
the  embrace  of  reason.  Men  have  done  this  very  thing 
with  the  phrases  of  our  Lord.  They  have  wrought  the 
precious  ore  of  truth  into  coins  stamped  with  their 
own  superscription.  This  is  the  divine  mintage,  we 
are  assured.  Take  it,  cash  it  in  the  currency  of  con- 
duct, and  you  are  forever  exempt  from  spiritual 
bankruptcy.  The  method  I  submit  is  alluring.  It 
appeals  to  the  egoism  of  the  mind.  If  I  can  fix  reve- 
lation in  the  moulds  of  human  science,  what  a  triumph 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  197 

for  my  skill  as  a  dialectician!  Surely,  I  shall  honor 
the  message  of  my  Master,  and  incidentally  bring 
it  within  the  understanding  of  my  less  discerning 
neighbor. 

Tread  slowly,  my  friend.  There  are  serious  questions 
that  you  will  have  to  meet  in  your  attempt  to  frame 
a  system.  Has  it  ever  occurred  to  you  that  you  might 
leave  out  the  living,  breathing  Christ  Himself?  In 
the  early  creeds  of  the  church  the  acute  intellect  sought 
to  uncover  the  anatomy  of  His  person.  It  thought  by 
a  species  of  dissection  to  explain  surgeon-like  the  uses 
of  nerve  and  tissue,  and  the  organic  compactness  of 
the  whole.  But  tell  me,  can  one  probe  to  the  heart 
while  life  is  still  in  the  body?  The  achievements  of 
modern  surgery  upon  the  living  body  have  touched  the 
lay  imagination  by  their  daring  and  success,  but,  as 
everyone  knows,  one  thrust  of  the  blade  beneath  the 
surface  of  the  cerebrum  brings  instant  death.  Does 
Jesus  live,  I  ask,  in  the  creed  of  Nicea,  as  He  does  in 
the  Gospel  of  John?  Can  you  feel  the  pulse  of  master- 
ing love  in  the  sentences  that  struggle  to  invest  this 
Christ  with  the  attributes  of  Deity?  Believe  me,  I  do 
not  plead  for  the  destruction  of  the  ancient  confes- 
sions; I  ask  only  for  their  re-interpretation  under  the 
spell  of  a  personal  Presence.  Love  does  not  shine 
in  the  formulas  of  logic.  Love  thrills  through  the 
heart  that  has  touched  the  Hand  of  Love.  We  know 
Christ  not  in  the  theology  of  the  schools,  but  in  the 
almost  sentient  glow  of  the  closet  and  the  altar. 

The  test  of  love  is  of  two  kinds.  One  I  have  de- 
scribed ;  the  other  is  more  familiar,  but  for  that  reason 
perhaps  more  diflScult  to  understand.  The  devotion  of 
the  Christian  is  tried  in  the  crucible  of  duty.  Let  us 
at  once  particularize.    "  If  ye  have  love  one  to  another, 


198  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ye  shall  prove  the  genuineness  of  your  love  to  me." 
Despite  what  we  said  as  to  the  naturalness  of  the 
benevolent  impulse,  the  practice  of  love  is  the  hardest 
task  in  human  life.  The  child  of  the  home  knows  it; 
the  citizen  in  the  state  is  aware  of  it;  the  nation  as 
a  bounded  group  knows  it  all  too  keenly.  When  inter- 
ests conflict  love  flies  out  and  hatred  enters.  Resent- 
ment claims  its  trophies  and  calls  them  nature's  right- 
ful awards.  Instead  of  the  Christmas  chant  the  Hymn 
of  Hate  is  heard  in  the  street.  Its  strains  are  the 
music  of  marching  soldiers ;  its  theme  is  the  speech  of 
governments ;  its  cry  becomes  the  impassioned  voice  of 
patriotism.  Men  go  down  to  death  with  its  withering 
chords  upon  their  lips.  Hate  that  absorbs  the  enthu- 
siasm of  conflicting  millions  cannot  be  without  moral 
power. 

But  what  can  hate  do?  Can  it  bind  up  the  wounds 
of  body  or  reorganize  the  distracted  emotions  of  the 
mind  ?  What  can  hate  do  ?  Can  it  disentangle  the  web 
of  mistrust  and  suspicion,  which  ignorance  has  woven 
about  the  intercourse  of  states?  What  can  hate  do? 
Can  it  recover  the  balance  of  judgment,  the  supremacy 
of  reason,  which  is  the  just  heritage  of  men  made  in 
the  image  of  God?  Can  hate  do  this?  Has  it  ever 
done  this?  The  answer  is  made  in  the  record  of  its 
opposite.  Observe  what  love  has  done  and  will  do.  The 
letter  is  from  a  soldier  of  a  country  which  has  adopted 
the  Hymn  of  Hate  as  its  national  anthem: 

"  Dear  Sir, — I  have  promised  your  son  to  write  this  to  you. 
By  the  good  guidance  of  God  I  found  your  son  in  a  shell  hole 
wounded.  He  had  lain  there  two  days.  As  the  Lord  J6sus  Christ 
bids  us  love  our  enemies,  I  ministered  to  him,  bound  up  his 
wounds,  and  gave  him  wine  and  bread.  In  a  short  time  he  revived, 
and  I,  with  some  of  my  men,  carried  him  to  a  place  of  safety.  He 
is  now  in  hospital,  being  well  cared  for." 


LOVE  IN  THE  CRUCIBLE  199 

To  love  one's  enemies  is  soon  to  change  that  enemy 
into  a  friend.  Love  may  stand  out  against  hate  to 
the  end  of  the  road,  but  hate  will  surely  melt  away 
beneath  love's  fervent  rays.  The  proof  positive  of 
allegiance  to  Christ  will  be  found  in  the  number  of 
men  and  women,  whose  antagonisms  we  have  deliber- 
ately sought  to  annul.  To  immerse  oneself  in  the 
problems  and  dangers  of  a  missionary  career  is  a  true 
index  of  a  true  consecration.  Yet  there  is  something 
impersonal  about  it.  We  stand  in  the  offing,  so  to 
speak;  we  ride  the  waves  as  lightships,  guiding  mis- 
governed souls  away  from  shallows  and  rocks;  we 
touch  but  are  not  touched;  we  move  like  charmed  fig- 
ures through  the  mass  of  sorrow,  sin,  and  dread,  like 
Una  in  the  "  Faerie  Queene." 

"  As  bright  as  death  the  morning  stars  appear, 
Out  of  the  East  with  flaming  locks  bedight, 
To  tell  that  dawning  day  is  drawing  near. 
And  to  the  world  does  bring  long-wish&d  light; 
So  fair  and  fresh  that  Lady  shewed  herself  in  sight." 

Far  be  it  from  me  to  belittle  the  enthusiasm  that 
calls  devoted  spirits  away  from  home  and  country  to 
unknown  peoples  and  their  haunts  unknown.  I  honor 
them  and  many  of  them  I  love  with  a  friendship  born 
of  uncounted  years  of  intimacy.  But  the  most  galling 
test  of  Christian  love  is  not  to  be  found  in  service 
at  the  front.  In  the  fine  zeal  and  splendid  rapport 
that  carries  even  craven  souls  out  of  their  congenital 
weakness,  it  is  not  hard  to  express  one's  love  to  Christ. 
But  in  the  long,  long  hours  of  unheroic  work,  when 
your  comrade  bides  his  time  to  thrust  the  dagger  into 
your  heart,  what,  we  demand,  shall  be  the  quality  of 
love  which  arrests  the  angry  word  by  your  teeth's 


200  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

edge,  and  holds  the  strained  arm  tight  by  your  side? 
That,  I  take  it,  is  "  keeping  his  commandments."  That 
is  heroism,  that  is  will.  Show  me  the  man  who  is 
steadily  rotting  his  flesh  away  among  his  leper  colo- 
nists and  I  will  show  you  a  man  urged  and  moulded  by 
the  pure  essence  of  Christian  loyalty.  But  show  me 
again  the  man  who  turns  a  deaf  ear  to  reprisal  and 
willingly  endures  insult  rather  than  wound  another, 
and  I  will  write  the  record  of  a  life  so  holy  and  true, 
that  it  shall  have  a  right  to  stand  emblazoned  by  the 
side  of  that  Life  whose  most  sublime  intent  was  framed 
in  the  prayer,  "  Father  forgive  thean ;  for  they  know 
not  what  they  do."  Love  that  is  not  easily  provoked 
has  kept  the  commandment. 


XIII 
THE  PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION 

John  H  :20.    "  At  that  day  ye  shall  know 
that  I  am  in  the  Father" 

"AT  that  day"— at  what  day?  When  did  the 
Z-k  pupils  of  Jesus  become  perfectly  aware  of 
■^  -^  His  unmixed  and  perpetual  divinity?  Ob- 
viously they  did  not  detect  its  terms  in  the  fateful 
hour  that  sealed  this  last  intercourse  with  Him.  The 
future  tense  assures  us  that  their  trembling  minds 
had  up  to  that  moment  utterly  failed  to  comprehend 
His  character.  If  Peter  buoyed  on  the  wave  of  sudden 
intuition  exclaimed,  "  Thou  art  the  Christ,  the  Son  of 
the  Living  God,"  he  was  repeating  the  formula  of  an 
ancient  creed,  not  the  conviction  of  a  reasoned  faith. 
Jesus  was  to  them  a  problem,  as  He  has  been  to  the 
world  of  men  ever  since.  They  were  to  know  His  inner 
heart  some  day,  but  when,  the  Master  did  not  clearly 
foretell.  He  was  content  to  let  them  study  the  phases 
of  the  problem. 

It  is  no  blur  to  the  superlative  dignity  of  Christ 
that  He  should  appear  to  men  in  the  guise  of  a  problem 
to  be  worked  out.  The  student  is  continually  con- 
fronted with  the  hints  of  undiscovered  facts.  Thus, 
you  cannot  look  into  your  neighbor's  eye  without  learn- 
ing that  he  is  to  you  not  a  well  of  translucent  water, 
but  a  dark  glass  through  which  you  sometimes  peer 
in  vain  to  catch  the  first  familiar  element.    You  face 

301 


202  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

here  the  fundamental  query,  whether  he  be  of  mental 
structure  like  your  own.  Has  he  the  same  personal 
aptitudes,  the  same  likes  and  dislikes,  the  same  hopes 
and  fears  as  you?  The  quest  of  the  eager  lover  for  a 
response  to  his  love  is  as  nothing  in  complexity  com- 
pared to  your  inquiry  into  the  mind  which  by  analogy 
you  deem  to  inhabit  the  moving  figure  by  your  side. 
The  fact  of  the  reality  of  another  mind  you  do  not 
doubt;  but  how  to  reach  valid  grounds  for  exami- 
nation is  to  you  the  persistent  problem. 

Yet  with  all  its  bewildering  entanglements,  the  prob- 
lem of  personality  does  not  daunt  the  inquirer.  Nor 
does  the  Christian  student  remain  long  quiescent 
before  the  more  fascinating  problem  of  his  Lord's 
nature.  If  Jesus  be  "  in  the  Father,"  a  fact  unequiv- 
ocally aflBrmed  by  Holy  Writ,  how  shall  we  approach 
the  problem  so  as  at  length  to  reach  a  complete  under- 
standing of  its  cardinal  facts?  The  problem,  it  seems 
to  me,  is  threefold :  it  is  a  problem  of  record,  of  science 
and  of  private  experience. 


The  religion  of  Christ  is  staged  among  the  vital  move- 
ments of  the  human  race.  Its  origins  are  not  lost  in 
the  crabbed  fogs  of  a  nation's  antiquity.  Who  can 
scientifically  trace  the  growth  of  the  Hercules-myth  in 
Greece?  That  the  Orphic  rite  which  made  Hercules 
its  patron  saint  exercised  a  powerful,  not  to  say  benef- 
icent influence  upon  Greek  thought,  no  one  will  deny, 
but  that  the  favorite  hero-god  ever  had  a  history  in  the 
game  sense  that  Alexander  or  Plato  had,  only  the  most 
ingenuous  would  claim.  The  life  of  Jesus,  on  the 
other  hand,  had  its  genesis  and  growth  amid  a  people 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      203 

noted  for  their  practical  habits.  The  poetic  sym- 
bolism of  Homer  and  Hesiod  was  absent.  Whatever 
miraculous  element  entered  the  fabric  of  their  history 
was  of  the  practical  sort ;  it  served  definite  providential 
ends.  In  the  amazing  transactions  of  the  Gospels  the 
purposive  aspect  is  never  obscured.  The  miracle,  to 
use  a  common  epigram,  becomes  an  acted  parable. 
Truths  that  the  reason  fails  to  grasp  grow  warm  and 
palpitant  when  the  senses  of  the  body  respond  to 
concrete  stimulus. 

More  than  that,  the  life  of  Jesus  is  enshrined  in  a 
definite  record.  Being  historic,  as  the  exploits  of 
Alexander  are  historic,  it  is  subject  to  delineation 
on  a  written  page.  The  poet  roams  the  uncharted  cir- 
cuits of  fancy  in  order  to  fashion  his  hero.  The  his- 
torian pursues  the  strictly  defined  avenues  of  fact  as 
laid  out  in  certified  events.  If  Jesus  be  a  character 
conceived  by  John  and  Paul  and  the  mind  of  the  infant 
church,  then  the  words  we  read  in  the  New  Testament 
are  the  words  of  a  poet  and  not  an  historian,  and 
are  to  be  critically  examined  as  such.  But  if  the 
Figure  of  Jesus  be  historic  and  the  events  of  His  life 
clearly  known,  then  we  have  as  much  right  to  find 
faithful  histories  in  these  books  as  in  the  Commentaries 
of  Julius  Caesar.  Esteeming  the  Gospels  as  a  record 
not  a  poem,  we  are  constrained  to  meet  certain  objec- 
tions which  criticism  from  time  immemorial  has 
alleged.  These  objections  in  many  cases  would  have 
died  on  the  lips  if  the  events  of  the  Life  here  portrayed 
had  been  as  commonplace  as  those  of  the  famous 
Roman  campaigner.  But  since  Jesus  is  said  to  have 
incarnated  God  men  are  asking  by  what  right  four 
books  can  formulate  and  record  such  a  judgment. 

The  objector  thrusts  his  blade  first  into  the  unique- 


204  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ness  of  the  record.  Here,  he  says,  are  the  most  re- 
markable facts  ever  developed  in  the  long  eras  of 
human  activity.  The  Deity,  whom  the  rapt  seer  of 
Israel  could  discern  only  in  the  secrecy  of  spiritual 
communion,  is  now  revealed  for  common  eyes  to  be- 
hold. Here  again,  he  says,  are  facts  that  bear  the  most 
momentous  consequences  to  the  entire  race.  Moral 
progress,  civil  welfare,  the  religious  attainments  of 
generations  unborn  hang  upon  His  life.  Confucius 
and  Moses  may  die  and  pass  away.  Civilizations  ener- 
gized by  their  words  vanish  and  leave  scarce  a  vestige 
behind.  But  Jesus'  words  and  Jesus'  works  carry 
safety,  hope,  health  for  a  blighted  world.  Why,  he 
asks,  is  the  memorial  of  such  a  life  confined  to  a 
single  group  of  documents?  Why — to  take  a  logical 
example — should  not  Josephus  have  seized  upon  this 
crucial  fact  and  emblazoned  it  on  his  history  of  the 
Jews?  About  it  his  pen  is  dumb.  Pious  scribes  jeal- 
ous for  the  honor  of  the  story  have  written  in  a  few 
lines  but  they  manifestly  are  stray  orphans  in  the 
text.  Must  we  not  at  least  hold  our  judgment  in  abey- 
ance hoping  that  some  day  we  shall  discover  the  cor- 
roborating evidence? 

I  answer  for  Josephus,  the  critic  of  his  day,  and 
he  will  stand  as  type  of  other  writers  of  the  same 
or  later  periods.  Why  did  he  have  nothing  to  say 
about  the  strange  happenings  in  which  some  hoped  to 
find  the  turning-point  of  Jewish  history?  The  most 
direct  reply  is  that  Josephus  was  the  mouthpiece  of 
the  political  and  not  the  religious  feelings  of  Judah. 
Though  learned  in  the  traditions  and  expectations  of 
his  people  he  was  caught  in  the  glare  of  Roman  im- 
perialism. He  sought  to  be  a  purveyor  of  the  new 
world-ideas  to  an  enslaved  race.     With    an    insight 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      205 

worthy  of  his  nation's  best  thought  he  saw  the  unfold- 
ing of  Rome's  political  genius.  The  time  for  petty 
kingdoms  was  gone,  the  era  of  cosmopolitan  dominion 
was  at  hand.  In  the  mind  of  Rome  law  and  govern- 
ment were  supreme.  Religion  played  an  insignificant 
part.  It  would  be  futile  then  to  lift  the  religious 
claims  of  Judea  in  rivalry  with  the  sweep  of  con- 
quering eagles  or  the  solidifying  effects  of  civil  statutes. 
To  him  to  whom  history  was  a  record  of  wars  and 
dynasties,  the  subjugation  of  peoples  and  the  intrigues 
of  courts,  the  controversies  of  religious  sects  seemed 
as  carrion  to  devouring  beasts.  In  other  words,  Jo- 
sephus  was  not  interested  in  the  development  of  the 
religious  life  of  the  Hebrews,  and  since  Jesus  declined 
to  seek  a  place  in  the  political  sun,  and  since  a  point 
of  contact  between  Christianity  and  Rome  was  at  first 
absent,  he  could  say  nothing  as  to  the  new  creed. 

Take  another  fact.  The  new  faith  had  been  espoused 
by  a  small  and  unimportant  group  of  citizens.  Its  be- 
ginnings were  shrouded  in  the  mists  of  obsctrity. 
Some  spiritual  movements  have  captured  at  once  the 
citadel  of  aristocracy  and  without  intending  it  laid 
their  fingers  upon  the  pulse  of  civil  authority.  They 
start  by  revolution.  The  essence  of  Christianity  is 
other.  It  develops  by  evolutionary  stages.  Its  power 
at  first  is  germinal.  You  plant  the  seed,  a  tiny  micro- 
scopic thing  of  life;  you  Jay  it  in  the  ground  and  wait 
for  time  and  sunshine  to  elicit  its  hidden  strength. 
Thus  Jesus  conceived  His  truth,  a  mustard  seed  so 
small  as  to  be  inconspicuous;  so  inconspicuous  as  to 
incur  the  neglect  of  observers.  The  rulers  did  not  be- 
lieve on  Him,  save  two;  one  came  to  Him  under  cover 
of  darkness,  the  other  after  death  to  claim  His  body. 
Feeble  beginnings  like  these  did  not  threaten  the  com- 


206  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

placence  of  the  Jewish  church.  What  reason,  therefore, 
might  a  great  historian  conjure  up  for  thinking  that 
they  would  affect  the  political  relations  of  Rome  and 
Jerusalem? 

It  is  perfectly  apparent  that  the  life  of  Jesus  could 
not  legitimately  be  found  portrayed  on  the  pages  of 
the  secular  historian.  Does  this  omission  argue  that 
the  life  was  never  lived?  If  so,  many  an  obscure  event 
which  has  proven  of  incomparable  value  to  society 
would  be  excluded  from  the  history  of  the  race,  and 
truth  would  be  turned  into  falsehood. 

Having  his  blow  parried  by  an  appeal  to  fact,  the 
objector  enters  the  second  thrust.  The  record,  he  says, 
was  written  by  men  who  were  interested  in  the  prem- 
ises, and  it  must  be  carefully  scanned  for  biased  state- 
ments. The  point  is  worthy  of  consideration.  Many 
brilliant  works  have  been  written,  in  which  not  so 
much  questions  of  fact  as  author's  opinions  are  at 
issue.  The  treatment  is  ex  parte  and  hence  unreliable. 
No  critical  reader  can  pass  through  the  chapters  of 
Macaulay's  History  of  England  without  feeling  that  he 
has  faced  not  so  much  the  chronicles  of  the  English 
Revolution  as  the  Liberalism  of  the  early  nineteenth 
century  read  back  into  the  events  of  the  seventeenth. 
To  be  a  good  historian,  you  must  certainly  cancel  the 
personal  equation  as  remorselessly  as  possible.  Never- 
theless this  does  not  mean  that  you  must  be  out  of 
sympathy  with  your  subject.  To  understand  an  his- 
toric character  you  must  somehow  constrain  yourself 
to  think  his  thoughts  and  travel  his  paths  with  faithful 
exactitude.  Whom,  for  example,  should  we  choose  to 
write  the  life  of  our  Martyr  President  ?  Could  Stephen 
Douglas  qualify  for  the  task?  His  was  a  brilliant 
synthetic  mind.     He  knew  the  political  situation  of 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      207 

the  times  and  its  antecedents  as  few  others  did.  He 
came  to  grips  with  Lincoln  in  the  memorable  debates 
of  the  Senatorial  campaign  and  his  attack  was  worthy 
of  his  foeman's  steel.  They  stood  upon  opposite  sides 
on  the  solemn  issues  of  the  day,  and  though  he  fought 
Lincoln  at  every  turn  and  defeated  him  once  he  never 
failed  to  evince  supreme  respect  for  his  opponent's 
courage,  intellect,  power,  and  zeal.  Shall  Douglas  write 
the  life  of  Lincoln?  Or  shall  we  commit  the  task  to 
another,  trained  in  his  youth  by  the  President's  side, 
getting  an  acquaintance  with  the  heart  of  Lincoln  as 
perhaps  none  other  could,  in  later  manhood  serving 
his  country  with  distinguished  success  in  diplomatic 
and  ministerial  capacities,  a  man  of  mind  and  heart, 
a  poet,  a  seer,  a  judge  of  human  motives,  a  student  for 
many  years  of  the  life  of  his  hero  after  its  close — 
shall  we  not  rather,  I  say,  commit  the  fashioning  of  this 
classic  story  to  John  Hay,  the  friend  and  scribe  of 
Lincoln  ? 

The  point  is  clear;  it  is  no  disqualification  to  the 
authors  of  the  Gospels  that  they  had  knowledge  of 
Jesus.  But  in  order  to  clinch  the  right  of  John  and 
Matthew,  Peter  through  Mark  and  Paul  through 
Luke,  to  write  of  Him,  I  submit  the  following  memo- 
randa. 

These  men  were  gifted  with  an  historic  temper. 
How  do  I  know  it?  Let  us  ask  which  of  all  mental 
qualities  we  must  demand  of  the  successful  historian. 
Two  spring  at  once  to  view.  We  demand  that  he  have 
what  we  may  call  an  historical  perspective.  If  the 
student  is  at  loss  to  fit  a  particular  event  into  the 
scheme  of  things  we  call  him  a  blunderer  in  his  field. 
History  is  not  a  series  of  moves  on  the  checkerboard, 
history  is  a  growth.    The  divine  events  which  startle 


208  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

our  gaze  in  the  Evangelical  record  are  as  genuinely 
subject  to  this  principle  as  the  remarkable  achieve- 
ments of  Augustus  Caesar.  The  Evangelists  realized  it 
and  were  at  pains  to  show  how  Jesus  moved  on  the 
face  of  the  Old  Testament,  how  He  passed  into  the 
unsuspecting  life  of  the  Roman  Empire,  how  He  met 
and  satisfied  the  moral  order  of  the  world,  so  that  the 
satires  of  Juvenal  appeared  like  an  unpremeditated 
forecast  of  the  very  delinquencies  Jesus  could  correct. 

Then  again  the  writer  of  history  must  be  an  expert 
in  sifting  evidence.  The  test  of  success  often  lies  just 
here.  Some  intellects  can  by  a  swift  intuition  fly  into 
the  heart  of  a  fact.  Most  men,  however,  are  forced  to 
debate  the  question  pro  and  con  in  order  to  discover, 
as  Luke  says,  the  "  certainty  of  things."  That  these 
first  Christian  chroniclers  exercised  their  judgment 
with  skill  and  balance  is  proven  by  comparison  with 
the  puerile  portraits  of  Jesus  which  were  produced  in 
the  second  century.  There  Jesus  appears  as  the  worker 
of  inconsequential  wonders,  the  young  boy  endowing 
clay-birds  with  life;  here  He  is  the  majestic  monarch 
of  nature  and  mind,  the  fearless  Preceptor,  the  holy 
Guide.  The  jury  of  medical  specialists  which  Renan 
demanded  to  test  the  Resurrection  could  not  have 
been  severer  critics  of  hasty  conclusions  from  insufli- 
cient  evidence,  than  the  four  Evangelists  were.  They 
deserve,  therefore,  the  respect  of  cautious  inquirers  and 
the  confidence  of  pious  believers. 

Having  framed  a  record  in  which  scientific  rules  are 
strictly  obeyed  shall  we  hesitate  to  accept  as  true  the 
facts  they  have  revealed?  The  first  problem  in  the 
study  of  the  Incarnation  meets,  if  anywhere,  its  solu- 
tion here.  If  a  man  can  believe  the  historical  validity 
of  our  experience  he  has  begun  to  understand  the 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      209 

message  which  the  Bible  embodies  in  various  ways 
throughout  its  whole  Revelation. 


II 

We  advance  to  the  second  problem  which  raises 
the  question  of  power.  For  the  personality  of  Jesus 
viewed  as  body  or  mind  has  certain  well-defined  values. 
It  has  impinged  upon  the  natural  order  and  taken  its 
place  among  the  fruitful  influences  of  the  world.  It 
must  be  judged  by  the  principles  of  science  already 
known  to  us.  Otherwise  we  should  have  to  ascribe  to 
Him  a  ghostly  character,  make  of  Him  a  Docetic 
Knight  who  trod  the  ether  for  a  season  and  then  dis- 
appeared. Now  every  problem  in  science  awakes  to 
two  queries,  How  does  the  event  take  place  and  Why? 
These  two  queries  we  propose  to  follow  here. 

The  person  of  Jesus  is  the  vehicle  of  power.  It  is 
one  form  of  the  divine  energy  which  spreads  itself 
over  the  entire  expanse  of  reality.  To  suppose  that  the 
universe  has  been  split  up  into  two  air-tight  compart- 
ments, mind  and  matter,  each  one  independent  of  the 
other,  or  if  dependent  one  but  the  shadow  of  its  neigh- 
bor, is  a  gross  and  stultifying  error.  The  energy  we 
know  is  one,  because  it  has  sprung  from  the  being  of 
One.  Therefore  no  new  form  can  enter  our  experi- 
ence to  contradict  what  has  resided  here  before.  Power 
as  we  observe  it  is  first  of  all  physical.  The  stars 
studded  in  the  abyss  of  space,  the  circling  planets, 
the  crumbling  rocks,  the  fleck  of  dust  are  all  charged 
with  the  same  coherent  force.  Early  thinkers  strove 
to  separate  it  into  its  elements,  fire,  air,  earth,  and 
water.  More  mature  science  grasped  the  notion  of  a 
law  of  gravity,  mass  and  motion,  the  two  constituent 


210  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

factors.  Present-day  study  has  begun  to  crystallize 
the  quest  for  a  unifying  force,  tending  to  find  in  the 
electric  current  a  common  denominator  for  every  out- 
put of  power.  But  whatever  be  the  elemental  terms  its 
varied  compounds  are  beyond  the  ingenuity  of  the 
scientific  mind  to  compute. 

Then  we  rise  to  another  level  of  power  in  the  living 
organism.  Whether  there  be  a  genetic  touch  between 
matter  living  and  matter  dead,  is  not  the  question 
here.  We  are  content  to  note  the  operation  of  power. 
The  power  of  an  organism  is  something  more  than  the 
sum  of  cells  and  tissues  defined  in  the  terms  of  chem- 
istry. Some  principle  as  real  as  the  principle  of  grav- 
itation has  fitted  them  into  a  whole.  The  dust  of  the 
earth  is  gathered  into  an  organized  body  and  the  body 
lives.  One  has  only  to  hear  the  elephant  crash  his 
way  through  the  jungled  forest  or  watch  the  beaver 
construct  his  remarkable  dwelling  or  see  the  dog  spring 
at  the  sound  of  his  master's  voice,  to  know  that  a  new 
form  of  power  has  entered  the  world,  different  from  the 
other  yet  using  the  very  materials  that  have  made 
mechanism  so  full  of  surprise  and  wonder. 

We  take  a  further  step  and  penetrate  the  region  of 
intellect.  Instinct,  common  to  brute  and  man,  is  sup- 
plemented by  the  light  of  reason.  Men  begin  to  put 
impressions  of  sense  together  and  to  produce  ideas. 
In  other  words,  they  think.  A  higher  potency  has 
broken  upon  the  world.  To  test  its  novelty  and  at 
the  same  time  its  worth  you  have  only  to  ask  if  re- 
flection will  carry  its  bearer  to  a  conclusion  w^hich  you 
cannot  at  the  moment  calculate.  The  things  mechan- 
ical we  can  calculate,  as  for  example  when  we  compute 
the  exact  return  of  Halley's  comet.  We  can  also  pre- 
dict what  type  of  action  an  instinct  will  give  birth  to. 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      211 

though  the  precise  direction  be  veiled.  But  man's 
mind  is  beyond  the  range  of  figures.  Brawn,  efifective 
as  it  is,  is  surpassed  a  thousandfold  by  brain.  Try 
to  understand,  if  you  will,  the  influence  that  the  idea 
of  freedom  has  exercised  upon  the  mind  of  society  as 
well  as  upon  the  forms  of  inorganic  matter.  Think 
how  the  feeling  of  order  crystallized  in  government 
and  law  has  changed  the  face  of  man  and  earth.  Con- 
ceive how  human  love — its  roots  perhaps  in  the  impulse 
common  to  all  the  higher  organisms — has  soared  far 
above  them  and  filled  the  world  with  the  fragrance  of 
sacrifice  and  pure  devotion.  That  power  such  as  this 
is  divine  precisely  as  the  other  forms  of  power  are, 
neither  the  poet  nor  the  scientist  can  deny. 

Every  one  of  these  aspects  of  power  is  manifest  in 
the  life  of  Jesus,  but  supremely  the  last.  It  is  His 
conscious  personality  which  I  find  speaking  from  the 
pages  of  the  Book.  It  is  His  insistent  divinity  poured 
into  channels  of  power  that  I  find  exercising  authority 
here.  For  I  do  not  think  of  the  Lord  as  simply  encased 
in  body,  the  body  that  you  and  I  haye.  To  me  mind  is 
superior  to  body,  just  as  the  human  species  is  superior 
in  impulse  and  function  to  a  lower  one.  If  it  were 
necessary  I  could  dispense  with  the  question  of  His 
remarkable  birth  and  manner  of  exit  from  the  world. 
Physical  genesis  and  death  are  not  the  salient  facts 
in  man's  career.  The  supreme  fact  of  man  is  his  re- 
flective moods.  Christ  was  a  man  like  us  because  He 
could  think.  The  main  point  in  the  Incarnation  is  that 
God  did  not  construct  a  new  vehicle  of  power  but  used 
the  finest  mould  already  known.  He  made  His  Son  a 
Person.  He  charged  mind  with  currents  of  grace  that 
from  His  day  to  ours  have  astounded  the  observer. 
If  Jesus'  personality  denotes  power,  as  the  simplest 


212  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

events  in  His  life  affirm,  then  we  conclude  that  in  order 
to  make  Himself  understood  the  Divine  Author  was 
constrained  to  assume  the  garb  of  consciousness,  so 
that  human  agents  everywhere  falling  into  converse 
with  Him  would  recognize  their  own  speech,  their  own 
words,  habits,  and  thoughts,  purified  from  mistake  and 
moral  inconsistency,  and  delivered  to  them  in  the  un- 
alloyed mintage  of  heaven.  The  scientific  query  How 
is  answered  in  the  language  of  St.  Paul,  "  He  was  made 
in  the  similitude  of  man." 

But  a  second  query  greets  us.  Why  does  God  be- 
come man?  It  may  surprise  a  good  many  readers  to 
be  told  that  science  is  asking  such  a  question  in  its 
own  sphere.  If  exact  submission  to  law  is  its  merci- 
less prerequisite,  how  can  purpose  which  may  or  may 
not  be  fulfilled  have  a  place  in  its  counsels?  Can 
Force  bend  to  the  observing  mind?  Well,  force  does 
yield  values  over  and  above  the  mechanical  work  it 
does.  For  every  time  I  construe  the  aesthetic  qualities 
of  a  breaking  wave  I  am  introducing  a  fact  unessential 
to  the  mechanical  composition  or  physical  pressure  of 
a  mass  of  water.  But  purpose  for  science  has  a  higher 
ministry  than  this.  Purpose  belongs  to  the  most  in- 
tricate processes  of  nature.  I  hold  a  tiny  sea-urchin 
in  my  hands  and  watch  its  behavior.  It  does  not 
remain  quiet,  it  is  constantly  in  motion.  Why  does 
this  tentacle  move,  why  that?  I  am  asking  a  question 
which  some  thought  did  not  belong  to  science.  Every 
reaction  sustained  by  the  tiny  body  has  a  meaning. 
It  grasps  for  food,  it  shuts  itself  up  against  a  foe. 
The  organism,  though  infinitely  less  complex  in  struc- 
ture than  the  leviathan  of  the  sea,  yet  has  every  right 
to  be  called  a  purposive  being. 

It  is  in  the  conduct  of  man  that  purpose  assumes 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      213 

its  sharpest  outline.  The  purposive  act  is  not  a  chance 
output  of  mental  energy,  it  is  the  settled  tendency  of 
reflection.  Thus,  the  act  of  speech  in  which  Bergson 
reads  the  highest  potencies  of  reason  is  a  direct  attempt 
to  interpret  my  feelings  to  other  minds,  which  I  deem 
to  have  kinship  with  my  own.  The  same  impulse  is 
enshrined  in  books  and  has  installed  the  treasures  of 
ancient  Greece  upon  the  shelves  of  modern  culture. 
By  the  genius  of  Bell  and  Edison  it  whispers  its 
syllables  through  the  invisible  currents  of  the  tele- 
phone and  restores  to  living  auditors  the  very  accents 
of  the  dead.  At  the  command  of  the  latest  magician 
it  vibrates  in  the  waves  of  electric  energy  flashed  by 
wireless  over  vast  oceans.  The  whole  career  of  man 
is  astir  with  the  movements  of  purpose  in  speech,  and 
no  less  in  action.  You  detect  it  in  his  business,  in  his 
social  environment,  in  his  political  obligations.  The 
elementary  thought,  the  highly  diversified  industry  is 
an  answer  to  the  question  Why  is  this  done.  Hence  the 
science  of  mind  like  all  other  natural  inquiry  is  bar- 
ren and  void  without  a  knowledge  of  the  several  ends 
which  the  subject  can  set  for  himself. 

But  it  is  impossible  to  confine  the  idea  of  purpose 
to  the  data  of  common  experience.  Divine  science 
dealing  with  the  imperishable  values  of  spirit  puts  with 
new  force  the  query  whose  classic  lines  '^  Cur  Deus 
Homo  "  had  won  a  brave  and  confident  assent  under 
the  spell  of  Anselm's  tuition.  The  issue  is  plain.  The 
personality  of  Jesus  is  not  imbedded  alone  in  the 
stratifications  of  human  history.  It  sends  its  roots 
down  into  the  eternal  principles  of  Deity.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  Cross  is  explained  by  the  impulse  of  love. 

This  last  phrase  is  a  subsidy  from  our  human 
psychology,  but  its  meaning  is  superbly  enriched  and 


214.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

is  for  the  first  time  adequately  revealed  when  inter- 
preted by  the  covenant  mercies  of  heaven.  For  an 
impulse  belongs  of  right  to  the  being  which  has  the 
power  to  make  it  function.  But  an  impulse  is  abor- 
tive unless  it  react  to  a  stimulus  from  without.  Man 
with  all  his  emotional  capacities  is  dumb  in  the  pres- 
ence of  rocks  and  mountains.  It  requires  the  sensitive 
ear  and  a  beating  heart  to  elicit  the  melodies  of  human 
companionship.  In  the  same  way  God  by  His  very 
nature  is  potential  in  His  love,  and  potential  only  until 
need  arises  among  His  creatures.  Then  love  bursts 
forth  in  the  crush  of  realized  purpose.  What,  we  ask, 
is  the  need,  the  spiritual  stimulus,  which  awakes  the 
undiscovered  impulse  to  its  strength?  I  answer  it  is 
the  fact  of  sin,  recorded  in  the  still-born  resolves  of  men 
and  nations,  in  the  bickerings  of  neighbors,  in  the 
slaughter  of  war,  in  the  betrayal  of  innocent  affection 
and  the  consolidated  traflSc  of  vice.  The  fairest  fabric 
next  to  the  divine  has  been  stained  and  seared  and 
seamed  with  unholy  motives.  A  race  whose  mental 
promise  has  soared  far  beyond  the  mimetic  thought  of 
the  brute  is  nevertheless  in  bondage,  morally  stricken, 
tangled  in  the  inextricable  web  of  its  own  devising. 
The  need  is  sharp,  action  must  be  taken  now  or  never. 
Shall  divine  love  remain  silent?  Can  love  which  al- 
ways tends  to  express  itself  resist  a  sufficient  cause? 
Shall  the  All-father  decline  to  enter  His  own  world  and 
change  spiritual  perplexity  into  healthful  order,  false- 
hood into  radiant  truth? 

In  the  darkness  of  the  night  the  shock  came  at 
Messina.  The  earth  trembled,  quivered,  gave  way  and 
engulfed  tens  of  thousands  of  helpless  sleepers,  men, 
women,  and  little  children,  in  its  devouring  rifts. 
Other  thousands  were    crippled,    homeless,    starving. 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      215 

The  news  was  flashed  at  once  around  the  world  and  in 
a  few  hours  the  great  heart  of  humanity  began  to  pour 
its  treasures  into  the  stricken  city.  Food  and  medi- 
cine, nurses  and  surgeons,  were  hurried  from  our  West- 
ern shores.  Congress  for  the  first  time  in  its  history 
voted  nearly  a  million  dollars  to  aid  a  group  of  sufferers 
outside  our  own  domain.  The  reason?  Love  for  man, 
the  philanthropic  instinct,  reacted  to  a  mighty  stimulus 
and  could  not,  if  it  would,  withhold  the  appropriate 
offering.  Is  it  conceivable  that  divine  Providence 
should  pursue  a  path  less  exalted  than  this?  When 
needs  are  spiritual  and  paramount  in  urgency,  shall 
love  remain  dumb,  inactive  and  pitiless  in  the  impen- 
etrable heart  of  Eternity?  Science,  which  has  its 
superhuman  implications,  replies  with  a  decisive  No. 
Purpose,  the  principle  of  life,  claims  its  just  and  ulti- 
mate expression  here.    God  will  redeem  the  world. 


Ill 

The  problem  of  the  Incarnation  enters  upon  a  third 
phase,  perhaps  the  most  difficult  of  all.  How  shall  the 
facts  of  Jesus'  life  become  reigning  motifs  in  the  music 
of  faith  ?  I  am  ready  to  admit,  you  say,  that  the  record, 
so  far  as  we  can  determine,  has  all  the  earmarks  of 
genuineness.  I  can  see  how  the  usual  dicta  of  science 
are  borne  out  by  the  mode  of  revelation.  The  manger, 
the  cross,  the  tomb  and  Olivet  are  securely  fitted  into 
the  scheme  of  history.  But  the  mind  is  not  yet  at  ease. 
I  cannot  extract  the  practical  meaning  of  these  trans- 
actions ;  they  decline  to  be  part  and  parcel  of  my  intel- 
lectual career.  The  difficulty  is  one  which  President 
King  of  Oberlin  has  called  the  "  seeming  unreality  of 
the  spiritual  life."     The  values  of  ancient  facts  are 


216  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

extremely  difficult  to  state.  If  I  could  only  get  a  dem- 
onstration as  clear  as  that  which  attends  the  unfolding 
of  a  theory  in  Euclid,  if  I  could  light  upon  an  ocular 
test  like  that  which  the  chemist  pursues  in  his 
laboratory,  my  mind  would  settle  down  to  firm  belief, 
and  I  should  to  all  intents  and  purposes  be  a 
Christian. 

In  answer  to  this  let  us  say  first  that  your  demand 
is  for  the  precise  objective  which  common  opinion  is 
always  harping  upon,  but  which  in  the  last  analysis 
is  rated  as  of  small  consequence.  Let  us  inquire  into 
the  case.  If  you  are  invited  to  invest  in  railway  secur 
ities  what  sort  of  questions  do  you  ask  ?  You  ask  after 
the  physical  equipment — the  roadbed,  quality  of  rails, 
terminals,  rolling-stock,  signal  system — and  that  is 
right.  Then  you  examine  the  ledgers  of  the  company  to 
find  out  what  the  methods  of  bookkeeping  are  and  how 
faithfully  they  are  followed.  Next  you  take  up  the 
balance  sheet  and  compare  assets  and  liabilities,  study- 
ing the  present  earning  capacity  and  the  rate  of  yearly 
increase.  Are  you  fully  satisfied?  The  most  important 
inquiry  comes  last.  What  is  the  character  of  the  men 
in  the  company's  management  ?  But,  I  venture  to  ask, 
is  that  really  essential?  You  have  evidence  of  what 
they  have  done;  isn't  that  enough?  Enough,  the 
answer  comes,  as  to  the  past  but  not  as  to  the  future. 
You  are  concerned  with  the  results  yet  to  be  attained, 
and  these  results  depend  eventually  upon  the  judg- 
ment, skill,  and  moral  responsibility  of  the  officials. 
But  these,  I  interpose  again,  are  intangible  items  and 
cannot  be  reduced  to  figures  or  material  weights.  Still 
you  cling  to  your  notion  that  a  railway  is  what  its 
directors  make  it,  and  its  securities  are  available  only 
in  so  far  as  its  management  can  be  trusted.    You  are 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      217 

right.  The  invisible  habits  of  the  human  mind,  the 
submerged  motives  that  drive  to  action  are  the  final 
arbiters  in  the  conduct  of  business.  The  matter  is 
sifted  down  to  the  fact  that  you  must  have  faith  in  the 
men  at  the  head  of  the  concern,  or  they  will  never  get 
a  cent  of  your  money.  In  other  words,  your  interests 
are  solely  in  the  relations  of  soul,  not  in  the  prices  of 
steel  and  labor.  Shall  religion  be  expected  to  pursue 
any  other  plan  than  that  which  proves  its  worth  a 
thousand  times  in  every  social  condition? 

But  Christianity  is  not  content  with  dealing  with  the 
shadows  of  thought ;  it  comes  out  into  the  open  and  is 
ready  to  offer  the  very  standard  that  current  skep- 
ticism asks.  If  something  definite  be  needed  to  prove 
the  power  of  the  new  faith  a  well-seasoned  apologetic 
will  give  it.  The  evidence  will  be  twofold.  It  will 
present  a  man  who  has  exchanged  the  coarse  and 
shabby  cloak  of  selfishness  for  the  pure  garments  of  a 
righteous  life.  Monuments  more  enduring  than  marble 
are  erected  in  the  Pantheon  of  Christian  sainthood. 
Resignation  before  which  the  Stoic  submission  of 
Seneca  pales  and  crumbles,  resolution  more  daring 
than  that  of  Cato  the  Censor  in  his  defiance  of  Roman 
wrath,  the  sweetness  of  temper  whose  fragrance  absorbs 
the  odors  of  sanctity  breathed  by  an  Aurelius — these 
are  witnesses  to  the  virtue  of  truth.  If  in  each  case  we 
probe  deep  into  the  heart  of  the  believer  we  shall  find 
lodged  ineradicably  there  the  creed  of  Jesus  the 
Divine. 

To  this  public  evidence  we  add  another  of  the  same 
kind.  I  mean  the  church  with  her  Sabbath  and  her 
Word,  her  sacraments,  her  ministry,  and  her  sublime 
hymns.  To  remove  the  church  from  the  records  of  the 
past  fifteen  centuries  would  be  to  cut  the  heart  out  of 


218  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  forest's  oak,  sweep  the  recurring  tides  from  the  bed 
of  ocean,  blot  the  stars  from  the  escutcheon  of  the 
sky  and  eliminate  law  forever  from  the  purview  of 
human  history.  The  place  of  the  Christian  community 
is  secure.  Nevertheless,  let  us  not  mistake  in  defining 
the  idea  of  the  church.  We  do  not  in  the  first  instance 
refer  to  a  religious  organism  with  its  potentates  and 
councils,  cathedrals,  creeds,  and  ceremonials,  as  the 
fundamental  principle  of  the  church.  If  the  church  be 
that  and  nothing  more,  then  multitudes  of  people  in 
every  Christian  country  live  and  die  untouched  by 
the  oflSces  of  religion. 

But  the  church  is  all  this  and  a  good  deal  more.  It 
is  the  testimony  of  spirits  throughout  the  ages  bound 
by  unseen  ties  into  unity  of  faith  and  charged  at  every 
point  with  loyalty  to  a  divine  Christ.  It  begins  with 
the  company  in  Judea,  men  of  common  blood  and 
common  spiritual  ancestry.  It  expands  under  the 
magic  touch  of  a  new  universalism  held  and  preached 
by  the  young  university  man  from  Tarsus.  It  breaks 
into  wider  areas  in  the  fourth  century  when  Atha- 
nasius  standing  for  the  full  deity  of  Jesus  demands  the 
expulsion  of  the  heretical  Arians  from  the  communion 
of  the  church.  It  emphasizes  its  office  as  the  dominant 
social  force  of  Europe  in  those  marvelously  fruitful 
centuries  which  we  erroneously  call  "  dark."  With 
clarion  voice  it  courses  the  valleys  and  scales  the  hills 
in  the  garb  of  the  preaching  friars,  disciples  of  St. 
Francis  and  Dominic.  Then  a  new  day  wakes  to 
glory,  and  out  of  uncertain  vision  and  corrupt  habit 
the  note  of  faith  is  heard  in  more  persuasive  melodies. 
Luther  and  Zwingli,  Calvin  and  Knox,  proclaim  the 
gospel  of  a  Risen  Saviour,  whose  salient  merits  and 
not  the  mischievous  decrees  of  Indulgence  open  the 


PROBLEM  OF  THE  INCARNATION      219 

portals  of  hope  to  staggering  humanity.  Thus  much 
has  the  church  accomplished. 

But  her  work  is  just  beginning.  The  deadness  that 
inevitably  creeps  over  religious  enthusiasm  and  strikes 
the  fervid  soul  with  the  damp  of  death  is  but  a  chal- 
lenge to  her  initiative.  To  Socinianism,  to  Deism,  to 
the  Skepticism  of  France,  the  word  of  inspired  author- 
ity is  spoken.  Wesley,  Francke,  Massillon,  lift  again 
the  ensign  of  truth,  Christ  the  imperial  Lord,  and  under 
their  passionate  leadership  a  new  Evangelism  takes 
hold  upon  the  conscience  of  Europe.  In  due  time  under 
the  pressure  of  enlarged  social  ideals  the  church  fash- 
ions the  world-wide  scope  of  her  mission.  To  India,  to 
slumbering  China,  to  Japan  just  escaping  from  her 
medieval  Samurai,  to  the  far-off  Islands  in  their  pagan 
obliquity — to  these  the  church  which  maintains  the 
Deity  of  Jesus  has  sent  her  choicest  sons  with  the 
message  of  redeeming  grace.  Historical  experience  can 
yield  no  positive  proof  to  the  solemn  verities  of  the 
spirit;  but  triumphs  like  these  give  point  to  the  fact 
that  not  theorists  who  have  stripped  the  robes  of  beauty 
from  His  form,  emasculated  His  face,  and  made  Him  a 
creature  like  themselves,  but  believers  who  steadily 
through  doubt  and  terror  and  the  pains  of  death  have 
held  aloft  the  standard  of  the  supernatural  Christ, — 
these  have  brought  the  idea  of  the  church  to  its  present 
definition. 

If  still  it  be  demanded  that  public  evidence  should 
add  its  voice  to  the  consent  of  private  faith,  I  point 
with  no  uncertainty  to  the  Christian  church  and  invite 
the  questing  soul  to  find  an  anchorage  there. 


XIV 
A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION 

John  14 :23.     "  We  will  come  unto  Mm 
and  make  our  aiode  with  him." 

THE  legal  mind  has  been  variously  occupied  with 
schemes  for  broadening  the  financial  interests 
of  the  nation.  It  has  recognized  the  natural 
instinct  of  social  elements  to  unite  for  common  pur- 
poses. The  government  of  a  state  is  the  formal  proof 
of  man's  ability  to  coordinate  private  desires  and 
general  good  in  a  mutually  satisfactory  system.  Prim- 
itive economics  presents  forms  of  partnership  aimed  at 
individual  ends  through  joint  action.  If  two  men 
agree  to  pool  their  efforts  and  divide  the  catch  after  a 
day's  fishing  they  are  examples  of  the  principle  of  co- 
operation which  lies  at  the  root  of  modern  business. 
When  the  social  fabric  grows  more  complex,  the  terms 
are  changed  but  the  method  remains  the  same,  one  man 
contributing  the  capital  to  the  enterprise,  the  other 
the  brains.  The  common  denominator  of  mind  and 
matter  has  been  determined  at  least  for  commercial 
purposes. 

In  the  industrial  order  of  the  present  we  have  to 
deal  with  four  principal  factors — capital,  skill  of  ad- 
ministration, skill  in  handling  raw  materials,  and 
methods  of  distribution.  To  each  of  these  factors 
there  is  a  corresponding  problem,  but  two  are  especially 
marked  in  recent  economic  history.     The  first  is  a 

220 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         221 

matter  of  money.  Shall  the  entire  capital  stock  be 
paid  in,  every  dollar  representing  an  exact  equivalent 
in  physical  equipment;  or  shall  a  portion  of  the  stock 
be  merely  on  paper,  assigned,  perhaps,  to  him  who 
promotes  the  scheme,  hence  only  "  water "  and  not  a 
real  investment?  The  second  difficulty  has  to  do  with 
the  relation  of  the  company  to  other  companies  in- 
terested in  the  same  line  of  business.  Shall  compe- 
tition be  eliminated  and  the  smaller  man  forced  out  of 
business,  bringing  about  a  restraint  of  trade  and  a 
definite  rise  in  prices;  or  shall  cut-throat  rivalry  be 
pursued  with  the  victory  to  the  company  which  has  the 
biggest  surplus?  The  tangles  presented  to  the  jurist 
and  moralist  are  cunning  and  intricate.  It  is  extremely 
difficult  at  times  to  define  what  corporations  are  good 
under  the  law  and  what  are  not.  The  questions  which 
face  the  legislator  are  fundamental  in  importance.  It 
is  perfectly  justifiable  for  a  group  of  citizens  to  seek 
to  advance  their  private  interests  in  healthful  pursuits ; 
but  they  cannot  combine  so  as  to  interfere  with  the 
vested  rights  or  natural  expectations  of  other  men. 
The  frontier  between  legitimate  and  illegitimate  corpo- 
rations is  by  no  means  settled.  Time  and  care  and 
human  justice  alone  can  determine  it. 

The  principle  of  union  so  manifestly  a  boon  in  ma- 
terial ventures  has  application  in  a  realm  more  real. 
The  interests  are  higher  than  economic  needs ;  they  im- 
pinge on  spiritual  destiny.  Parties  involved  are  not 
limited  to  men  of  flesh  and  blood.  They  include  the 
worshipful  presence  of  God.  How  shall  the  Christian 
mind  envisage  the  union?  Jesus  frequenting  the 
cluster-crowned  hills  of  Galilee  thought  of  the  union  of 
the  branch  with  the  vine,  sap  and  strength  being  de- 
rived from  a  common  stem.     Paul,  acquainted  with 


222  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  Greek  idea  of  physical  perfection,  took  as  his 
symbol  a  body  responding  to  the  directive  power  of  the 
head.  John  and  Paul  and  Jesus,  too,  likened  the  union 
to  the  sacred  relation  of  marriage,  where  personal  in- 
clinations are  lost  in  common  love,  and  individual  pre- 
rogatives in  the  service  of  the  home.  These  are  peren- 
nial types,  old  yet  new  to  their  age.  To  them  we  may 
add  a  more  modern  symbol  whose  spiritual  values  are 
nevertheless  the  same.  For  the  idea  of  corporate  life 
by  which  Paul  explained  the  meaning  of  the  church 
has  been  adopted  in  very  name  by  current  jurispru- 
dence, and  has  assumed  a  place  of  cardinal  impor- 
tance in  the  growth  of  modern  finance.  If  in  turn 
Christian  thought  may  extract  lessons  of  moral  conse- 
quence from  economic  experience,  then  ancient  texts 
will  be  illuminated  with  meanings  drawn  from  the 
realm  of  practical  effort  and  breathing  the  struggles 
and  convictions  of  real  men.  For  God  the  Father,  says 
Jesus,  will  come  to  willing  hearts  and  organize  them 
into  a  fellowship,  bound  not  by  the  disputed  terms  of 
legal  statute,  but  by  the  grace  and  truth  of  heaven. 
We,  He  continues  (the  pronoun  becomes  plural),  will 
establish  a  permanent  connection,  an  abode,  a  spiritual 
corporation,  which  shall  defy  the  competitive  attacks 
of  foreign  interests  and  secure  an  adequate  return  on 
investments. 


How  is  the  commercial  organization  effected?  The 
methods  are  various  and  must  be  carefully  studied 
if  we  would  gain  some  idea  of  the  scope  of  modern  enter- 
prise. Let  us  select  the  most  familiar,  serving  as  an 
admirable  parable  for  religious  experience.  There 
exist  already  certain  companies,  small,  well  managed 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         223 

for  the  most  part  and  successful.  By  themselves  they 
can  cover  only  a  limited  area  of  trade.  The  commodity 
produced  is  essential  to  the  progress  of  the  nation  and 
is  regarded  by  many  as  the  barometer  of  economic 
health.  Presidents  and  directors,  salesmen  and  con- 
sumers, all  realize  that  division  of  effort  has  eaten  up 
profits  and  precluded  an  expansion  of  traflSc.  Just . 
then  a  man  of  exceptional  genius  arises  to  propose  a 
readjustment  of  relations.  Instead  of  many  scattered 
companies  let  us  organize  a  common  administration 
acting  as  trustee  for  the  several  bodies.  The  stock  of 
every  company  will  be  equitably  assessed  and  embodied 
in  the  general  fund.  Two  results  inevitably  follow: — 
the  executive  expenses  are  appreciably  reduced  and  the 
combined  resources  will  enable  the  corporation  to  com- 
pete for  business  in  markets  hitherto  quite  beyond  the 
reach  of  individual  producers.  The  dream  is  fasci- 
nating, all  the  more  so  because  the  peculiar  transactions 
total  a  sum  which  dwarfs  the  revenues  and  disburse- 
ments of  all  save  the  greater  governments  of  the 
world.  Can  the  dream  be  made  a  fact?  Conservative 
investors  look  askance  at  the  extravagant  claims.  So- 
licitors begin  to  consult  their  books  for  legal  authority 
to  construct  so  mighty  an  engine  of  business.  Poli- 
ticians stop  to  calculate  what  effect  the  new  social  phe- 
nomenon will  have  upon  the  course  of  legislation. 
Meantime,  the  genius  of  the  promoter  is  at  work.  He 
has  obtained  the  consents  of  stockholders  and  directors, 
secured  favorable  advice  from  legal  counsel,  and  taken 
out  articles  of  incorporation  for  a  company  whose 
stock  reaches  the  incredible  amount  of  a  billion 
dollars. 

To  pursue  the  parable  is  unnecessary.    The  lessons 
extracted  from  the  new  fiscal  order  write  themselves 


224  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

plainly  upon  the  sky.  There  is  first  the  human  situ- 
ation itself.  We  begin,  you  see,  with  our  feet  on  the 
earth.  I  cannot  tell  what  the  divine  Lord  would  do 
with  a  race  of  men  whose  temper  had  never  been  spoiled 
by  a  lapse  from  honor.  It  may  be  that  He  would  have 
entered  His  world  in  the  presence  of  the  Son,  whether 
men  had  moiled  and  toiled  in  their  sin  or  not.  Fancy 
will  dictate  a  thousand  seductive  schemes  which  might 
have  had  place  in  a  world  different  from  our  own.  But 
fancy  is  not  our  guide.  The  plain,  unsophisticated 
facts  of  history  alone  suffice.  The  facts  are  these. 
High  ideals  throbbed  inchoately  in  the  heart  of  the 
race.  These  ideals  sought  utterance,  as  ideals  must. 
The  way  was  choked  by  scorn,  by  lawlessness,  irrever- 
ence, lust,  and  hate.  The  ideals  struggled  for  response 
in  the  individual  breast,  in  the  social  conscience,  in  the 
governments  of  earth.  Response  was  denied  them. 
They  were  hampered  by  the  attitude  we  call  sin.  If 
response  had  not  been  denied  them  these  same  ideals 
could  have  covered  the  surface  of  human  life  with  a 
supernal  light,  just  as  commercial  diligence  might  bring 
a  necessary  commodity  to  every  home  and  nation  but 
for  the  natural  limits  of  time,  energy,  and  faith.  The 
situation  confronting  the  dream  of  spiritual  empire  is 
very  simple;  it  is  sin  opposed  to  the  unconquerable 
optimism  of  hope. 

Then  enters  the  organizing  Genius.  He  comes  to 
make  His  abode.  He  has  viewed  with  alarm  the  dis- 
tracted conditions  of  His  world.  He  has  seen  man 
devour  man  and  nation  destroy  nation.  He  has  probed 
the  heart  of  Alexaader  and  found  there  insatiable 
greed ;  of  Mohammed  and  detected  a  clamorous  vanity ; 
of  Caesar  Borgia  and  been  revolted  by  the  hideous 
cruelties  reeking  therein.    He  has  visited  the  shrines 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         225 

of  Moloch  and  seen  tender  children  tossed  into  the 
monster's  flames;  He  has  watched  from  the  streets  of 
India  as  mistaken  zealots  hurl  themselves  under  the 
sacred  Car;  He  has  penetrated  the  inquisitorial  rooms 
of  the  Holy  Office  and  heard  the  moans  of  accused  her- 
etics; He  has  noted  the  ostracism  and  blight  under 
which  sensitive  souls  suffer,  because  they  could  not 
in  all  conscience  accept  the  modes  and  manners  of  a 
particular  religious  body.  Then  He  has  secreted  Him- 
self in  the  council-chambers  of  churches  to  hear  the 
jangled  chords  from  instruments  that  are  tuned  hypo- 
thetically  to  the  melody  of  the  spheres.  He  has  sat  in 
wonderment  and  pity  by  the  side  of  laboring  Christians 
whose  ardent  industry  mingled  with  tears,  perhaps  with 
blood,  brings  such  woefully  meager  returns.  He  has 
found  the  "  whole  creation  groaning  and  travailing  in 
pain  until  now,"  spiritual  ideals  shattered,  a  race  un- 
done. Is  it  vain  to  dream  of  correlation?  Shall  the 
divine  pulse  grow  slack,  stung  by  the  pressure  of  a 
thousand  woes? 

I  said  the  organizing  power  has  entered.  God  comes 
to  get  consents.  Mr.  Morgan  could  never  have  formed 
the  Steel  Corporation  without  the  voluntary  adhesion 
of  the  constituent  companies.  The  law  respecting 
property  rights  forbade  it.  I  see  no  reason  to  demand 
for  religion  a  relaxing  of  any  spiritual  rights.  The  re- 
ligious impulse,  I  take  it,  is  not  satisfied  with  candles 
or  incense,  the  hum  of  antiphonal  music  or  the  low 
clang  of  the  sacring  bell.  Nor  is  it  profoundly  moved 
by  the  logical  precision  of  the  creeds.  Feeling  and 
intellect  share  richly  in  the  life  of  the  obedient  Chris- 
tian. But  the  inward  hush  mistaken  for  repression 
is  in  fact  a  reply  to  the  higher  call  such  as  Paul  heard 
at  Damascus  and  Livingstone  by  the  factory's  loom. 


226  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Christianity  is  interested  in  nothing  save  the  whole 
man,  body,  mind,  and  will.  It  cannot  conceive  of  a 
spineless  religion  from  which  every  element  of  per- 
sonal initiative  has  been  eliminated.  It  is  in  essence 
alien  to  the  type  of  education  proposed  by  the  "  Chris- 
tian Brethren  "  under  LaSalle.  That  great  leader  was 
bent  on  reducing  the  pupil  to  a  machine,  by  persuasion 
if  possible,  otherwise  by  the  administration  of  the  rod. 
He  so  far  forgot  the  intrinsic  dignity  of  childhood  as  to 
require  the  offender  to  kneel  in  the  presence  of  the 
other  pupils  and  thank  his  preceptor  for  having  pun- 
ished him.  The  principle  is  wrong.  To  absorb  the 
individuality  of  a  man  into  the  offices  of  a  church  is 
contrary  to  the  spirit  of  our  faith.  We  may  bring  our 
intelligence  into  subjection  to  Christ  but  we  never  can 
surrender  the  right  to  determine  what  our  creed  shall 
be  and  what  our  specific  duty  in  the  world  is.  It  is 
to  the  inherent  power  of  choice  that  divine  love  appeals 
in  its  endeavor  to  shake  men  out  of  their  mistakes  and 
sins,  and  bring  them  face  to  face  with  eternal  right. 


II 

The  mode  of  approach  being  determined,  we  must 
now  examine  the  kind  of  securities  offered  by  the  cor- 
poration. It  is  apparent  at  once  that  they  represent 
substantial  values.  I  have  referred  to  the  current 
tendency  of  overcapitalization.  The  good  will  of  a 
simple  partnership  is  appraised  at  such  and  such  a 
sum.  In  the  more  complex  organizations  good  will  has 
been  stretched  to  cover  many  hypothetical  expectations, 
often  to  the  hurt  of  the  innocent  investor.  But  the 
legitimate  company  must  have  its  stock  exactly  equated 
by  its  physical  equipment,  so  that  if  need  arise  even 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         227 

under  forced  sale  the  assets  will  never  fall  below  the 
liabilities. 

That  the  same  danger  is  felt  in  the  religious  world  is 
proven  by  the  attempt  to  satisfy  spiritual  desire 
through  ritualistic  exercises.  Caji  fellowship  with 
heaven  be  won  by  a  sedulous  use  of  the  prayer-rug 
five  times  a  day?  Can  you  appease  an  offended  Judge 
by  laving  your  person  in  the  waters  of  a  sacred  river? 
Can  a  pilgrimage  to  Mecca  though  attended  with  peni- 
tential hardships  cause  a  man  to  forget  some  flagrant 
sin  and  reorganize  his  life  upon  a  safe  spiritual  basis? 
The  values  offered  to  the  soul  are  not  real.  They  are 
contrived  by  the  fancy  of  the  race  and  garnished  by  a 
thousand  presumptuous  promises.  Christianity  has 
another  message  rich  with  holy  meaning.  It  exposes  in 
merciless  terms  the  nature  of  sin,  its  sulphurous  heats, 
its  withering  breath,  and  the  helpless  crash  of  ambi- 
tions which  will  incautiously  build  upon  it.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  paints  the  vistas  of  the  future  with  the 
roseate  tints  of  heaven's  morning,  with  assurances 
drawn  not  from  the  croonings  of  a  mystic  asceticism 
but  from  the  bold  appeal  to  faith  that  bursts  as  Man's 
challenge  to  man  from  the  mouth  of  the  riven  tomb. 
These  things  are  substantial  verities,  not  wisps  offered 
by  an  effete  creed,  not  illusions  started  by  an  ingenious 
philosophy.  The  man  who  invests  his  time  and  energy 
in  Christian  service  gets  adequate  return  for  every 
penny  invested. 

'  The  securities  of  the  spiritual  corporation  have  a 
further  distinction :  they  are  permanent  in  value.  The 
mercury  of  finance  is  sensitive,  extremely  sensitive. 
It  is  affected  by  the  slightest  economic  or  political 
change.  If  rumors  of  war  are  abroad  the  prices  of  the 
most  seasoned  stocks  crumble  abruptly.     If  an  elec- 


228  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

toral  vote  ejects  one  party  and  introduces  another  the 
market  becomes  hesitant  and  uncertain.  Labor 
troubles,  bankruptcies,  a  President's  message,  or  the 
intangible  element  known  as  sentiment  will  cut  big 
segments  from  the  quotations  of  gilt-edge  securities. 
If  you  put  your  trust  in  the  stability  of  the  money 
market  you  will  be  thoroughly  disappointed.  If  you 
conduct  your  transactions  by  "  margin  "  and  not  by 
actual  cash  you  are  liable  to  lose  every  dollar  advanced, 
and  suffer  moral  stagnation  into  the  bargain.  To  the 
believer  in  Christian  truth,  however,  there  are  few 
fluctuations  in  values.  God  does  not  become  less  divine 
because  the  earthquake  overwhelms  an  unfortunate 
city  or  civilization  meets  its  baptism  of  fire  in  war. 
The  figure  of  Christ's  Saviourship  is  not  diminished 
because  Judson  is  forced  to  preach  for  ten  long  years  in 
Burma  ere  the  first  convert  is  made.  If  Marcion  and 
Celsus,  if  Voltaire  and  Paine  deny  the  virtue  of  re- 
deeming grace  can  their  unbelief  make  the  faith  of 
God  without  effect?  If  I  do  not  succeed  in  crushing  a 
wicked  habit  after  a  dozen  determined  trials,  shall  I 
count  all  spiritual  life  a  desperate  failure,  curse  God 
and  die? 

The  antithesis,  you  see,  lies  between  the  change  of 
human  feeling  and  the  permanence  of  truth.  The  same 
contrast  appears  ofttimes  in  the  quotations  of  the 
market  and  is  reflected  in  the  appraisal  of  the  com- 
pany's property.  The  stock  is  guaranteed  by  the  sol- 
vency of  the  corporation.  But  even  that  guaranty  may 
fail  and  through  some  unforeseen  catastrophe  the  credit 
of  the  company  may  be  swept  away.  To  such  a  danger 
the  questing  soul  is  never  exposed.  The  peace  of  mind 
which  it  covets  finds  its  warrant  in  the  Word  of  God 
and  is  supported  by  His  character,  two  immutable 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         229 

things  in  which,  says  the  sacred  writer,  it  is  "  impos- 
sible for  God  to  lie."  In  this  sphere  there  is  no  specu- 
lation, no  risk,  no  sale  on  margin.  Man's  estimate  of 
religious  values  may  vary,  but  the  truth  of  God's  love 
abides  secure.  If  you  admit  the  Cross  of  Christ  as  a 
definite  fact  into  your  corporate  life  you  are  safe. 

Still  again  the  nature  of  the  stock  should  be  ob- 
served. It  is  of  one  class  only.  Many  industrial  com- 
panies divide  the  stock  into  two  groups,  common  and 
preferred.  The  latter  pays  a  prescribed  rate  of  interest 
and  is  a  preferred  lien  on  the  property;  the  former 
measures  its  return  by  the  balance  of  earnings  for 
the  year.  Experience  has  proven  the  practical  value  of 
the  scheme,  since  commerce  has  its  ebb  and  flow.  But 
the  same  provision  is  not  needed  in  spiritual  interests. 
There  the  income  is  exactly  proportionate  to  effort.  It 
is  impossible  to  divide  the  citizens  of  the  kingdom  into 
two  groups  and  award  to  one  a  saintly  dividend,  to  the 
other  a  return  larger  or  smaller  or  none  at  all,  accord- 
ing to  the  volume  of  business.  Of  course  it  is  true 
that  every  member  gets  an  accrued  benefit  from  his  as- 
sociation with  the  church  at  large,  just  as  any  tax- 
payer, Christian  or  not,  reaps  an  increment  in  value 
to  his  property  from  the  peace  of  the  community 
secured  from  the  moral  influence  of  the  church.  It 
would  not  be  fair,  however,  to  make  individual  salva- 
tion depend  on  social  help.  If  that  were  the  principle 
at  stake  either  you  must  at  once  get  the  whole  body 
politic  into  a  regenerated  condition,  or  you  must  expect 
no  man  to  obtain  sufficient  grace  to  tide  him  over  the 
bar  of  social  degradation. 

The  double  classification  cannot  be  admitted  in  re- 
ligious experience.  Its  failure  in  the  composite  life 
of  society  is  being  written  today  in  blacker  terms  than 


230  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ever  before.  If  you  make  place  for  a  military  hierarchy, 
what  would  prevent  it  from  involving  the  nation,  a 
whole  contiment,  three-quarters  of  the  human  race,  in 
the  grim  issues  of  war?  If  you  establish  a  privileged 
class,  buttress  it  by  convention,  decorate  it  with  sound- 
ing titles,  give  it  a  commanding  place  in  political 
councils,  what  will  hinder  it  from  holding  the  other 
groups  submerged,  seething  in  vengeful  bitterness, 
unable  to  develop  the  simplest  functions  of  body  and 
mind,  hence  disinclined  at  the  moment  of  need  to 
address  themselves  to  the  sacrificial  defense  of  the 
nation?  The  principle  of  discrimination  has  not  been 
absent  from  the  Christian  church.  It  has  been  only 
too  active.  It  has  evolved  an  antagonism  of  interests 
between  clergy  and  laity  by  granting  to  one  group  a 
supersanctity  of  character.  It  is  ordained  that  the 
priest  alone  shall  have  access  to  superhuman  author- 
ity, that  he  alone  may  open  the  gate  of  salvation  by  the 
waters  of  baptism,  that  he  by  himself  shall  sip  the  cup 
of  Holy  Communion  lest  its  drops  should  spill  on  the 
ground  and  the  precious  blood  of  Christ  be  lost.  For 
centuries  such  a  principle  has  kept  the  education  of 
the  masses  in  the  clutches  of  a  few,  who  have  for  the 
most  part  been  unfit  to  prepare  their  subjects  for  this 
world  or  the  world  to  come.  The  result  was  at  first 
an  ignorant  people,  and  later  in  the  awakening  of  the 
social  mind  a  revolt  from  priestly  privilege  and  an 
assumption  of  important  offices  by  the  state. 

Against  this  double  classification  in  the  body  of  the 
church  the  temper  of  our  Christian  faith  has  always 
struggled.  It  has  always  had  to  fight  a  divisive  tend- 
ency in  theological  statement.  Two  types  of  minds 
clash  in  the  organization  of  a  creed.  The  mystic  hears 
the  whispers  of  intuition;  he  sees  straight  into  the 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         231 

heart  of  God.  The  logician  seeks  to  reduce  his  belief 
to  exact  phrase  and  orderly  sequence;  he  travels  by 
regular  steps  from  the  idea  of  God  to  the  minutest 
problem  of  the  individual  life.  How  can  we  harmonize 
the  two?  The  religion  of  the  Orient  failed  because  God 
could  speak  to  man  only  through  the  reaction  of 
common  instincts  on  the  subtle  fancies  of  the  poet. 
Christianity  unites  the  two  poles  of  thought  by  the 
magnetic  field  of  Personality.  Jesus  is  the  Son  of 
God  and  the  Son  of  man.  He  and  He  alone  can  dis- 
entangle the  elements  of  faith  in  the  mystic's  intu- 
ition and  the  reasoned  argument  of  the  scientist.  It 
was  He  who  stood  between  John  and  Paul,  who  linked 
that  daring  intuitionist  of  the  Reformation,  Martin 
Luther,  with  the  correlating  soul  of  Melancthon.  Wide 
apart  as  they  seem  in  religious  formulas  Bishop  Butler, 
who  taught  the  world  the  analogy  between  revelation 
and  the  causality  of  nature,  and  John  Wesley,  the 
apostle  of  immediate  salvation,  are  not  enemies  at 
heart.  They  see  eye  to  eye  and  soul  to  soul  when  Jesus 
the  divine  Person  is  unveiled  by  the  inward  sense. 
These  men  and  others  who  never  escape  from  obscurity 
may  join  the  corporate  life  of  the  church,  because  while 
signs  and  creeds  and  names  dififer,  the  Man  of  Calvary 
has  bound  each  by  invisible  chains  to  the  hope  of  re- 
demption through  His  sacrificial  death. 


Ill 

But  how  shall  we  state  the  obligations  imposed  on 
those  who  enter  the  perpetual  fellowship?  They  come, 
we  said,  by  definite  consent.  Is  consent  an  arbitrary 
motion  of  mind,  as  Epicurus  might  define  it?  Men 
do  not  enter  into  business  contracts  in  such  a  mood. 


232  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

The  will-to-act  is  based  upon  certain  well-digested  rea- 
sons. The  contracting  parties  believe  in  the  economic 
opportunity,  the  organic  form,  the  arrangement  of 
stock,  the  proposed  rate  of  interest,  the  integrity  and 
competence  of  the  management.  Therefore  they  are 
willing  to  invest.  In  other  words,  faith  has  assumed 
its  right  of  speech;  otherwise  all  finance  would  be- 
come a  welter  of  conflicting  timidities.  The  Christian 
community  has  an  incentive  no  less  controlling.  The 
difference  between  knowledge  and  faith  sharpens  at 
this  point.  Knowledge  deals  with  facts  under  the 
scrutiny  of  sense.  You  get  your  data  by  the  axe,  the 
lance,  the  microscope.  You  examine  the  object  and 
conclude  that  it  is  iron-ore,  cancer,  typhoid  bacillus. 
From  empirical  facts  you  begin  to  construct  a  science. 
But  knowledge  cannot  reach  very  far.  Comparison  is 
essential  to  exact  science  and  soon  you  arrive  at  a 
situation  where  the  common  factor  is  absent,  l^ou  are 
forced  to  judge,  to  hypothesize,  that  is  to  say,  to  move 
by  principle  and  not  by  fact.  Science  is  unwilling  to 
give  up  its  obedience  to  things;  nevertheless  it  is 
saved  by  faith  because  faith  offers  the  instruments  of 
progress.  Faith  transforms  business  from  a  paper- 
program  to  a  mighty  social  force.  Faith  digs  secrets 
out  of  nature's  heart  only  to  mould  human  life  by  their 
radiant  truth.  In  short,  faith  is  not  the  curator  of 
intellectual  curios,  but  the  pioneer  of  exploration  into 
undiscovered  worlds  of  thought. 

This,  then,  is  what  the  spiritual  investor  puts  into 
the  fellowship  of  the  church.  Faith  is  applied  as  the 
dynamic  of  action.  Let  me  show  you  how  faith  works. 
I  can  objectify  it  by  the  attitude  of  two  men  towards 
the  Bible.  The  first  student  brings  to  the  Book  a 
wealth  of  historical  knowledge  and  a  shrewd  critical 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         233 

taste.  He  seeks  to  arrange  the  several  parts  into  their 
appropriate  setting.  What  is  Exodus  but  an  exposition 
of  the  ritualistic  genius  of  Egypt  adapted  to  the  needs 
of  the  Semitic  religion?  What  are  the  imageries  of  the 
Revelation  but  skillful  expressions  of  a  poetic  temper- 
ament applied  to  the  struggle  of  the  new  church  against 
a  power  whose  symbol  was  the  sword?  He  also  clas- 
sifies the  theological  concepts  of  the  Book,  compares  the 
cosmogony  of  Genesis  with  the  cruder  stories  of  the 
Euphrates  Valley,  identifies  the  dramatic  motif  of  Job 
and  that  of  the  Medea;  proves  that  the  Apostle  John 
was  joined  here  with  Philo  to  the  philosophy  of  Alex- 
andria, and  contrasts  the  structure  of  the  Golden  Rule 
with  the  negative  form  of  the  same  maxim  in  Con- 
fucius. The  Bible  is  to  him  an  object  of  appreciative 
criticism  as  well  as  of  real  admiration. 

The  second  observer  may  or  may  not  bring  the  acu- 
men of  critical  insight  to  his  reading.  That  does  not 
matter.  He  brings  a  quality  in  advance  of  that;  a 
quality  which  evokes  a  profound  response  in  his 
soul.  This  man  knows  Job  and  Moses  and  the  Apos- 
tolic body  not  as  historical  personages,  dramatically 
conceived  in  a  book,  but  as  companions  in  the  same 
conflict  with  himself.  They  have  not  only  served  with 
distinguished  zeal;  they  have  served  for  a  principle, 
which  is  valid  for  the  struggles  of  today.  Hence,  they 
are  not  so  many  figures  passed  like  marionettes  before 
the  eyes  of  beholders;  they  are  men  who  command 
attention.  To  see  them  is  to  emulate  them.  One  might 
follow  Dante's  journeys  through  the  realm  of  Paradise 
without  ever  surprising  in  the  mind  a  desire  to  imi- 
tate him.  Who  would  for  a  moment  put  himself  in 
the  place  of  Faust  and  submit  deliberately  to  the  chal- 
lenge of  Mephistopheles?    But  David  the  singer  strikes 


234  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

from  his  lyric  Iiarp  silvery  notes  that  thrill  the  soul 
with  gladness.  Jeremiah  in  his  dark  dungeon  carries 
off  the  hero's  part  so  consistently  that  millions  have 
coveted  a  chance  to  follow  in  his  train.  Paul,  chastised 
by  enemies,  forgotten  by  friends,  worn  to  emaciation 
by  his  labors  for  the  kingdom,  yet  dauntless  in  courage, 
insisting  on  the  reality  of  his  Gospel,  making  the 
wrath  of  man  to  serve  the  welfare  of  the  kingdom — 
who  has  not  resolved  by  moving  heaven  and  earth  to 
reincarnate  him  once  again  in  Christian  service? 

The  first  student  of  the  Bible  brings  knowledge  to  his 
task,  the  second  student  seals  his  inquiry  by  faith.  It 
is  he  who  makes  the  Bible  a  force  in  the  councils  of 
men.  It  is  he  who,  passing  by  the  edge  of  criticism  and 
the  excess  of  adulation,  burns  its  truth  into  the  heart 
of  the  world.  John  Bunyan  plus  the  Bible  makes  al- 
legory a  social  engine  of  extraordinary  power.  William 
Carey  plus  the  Bible  sounds  the  first  note  of  doom  to 
the  hoary  caste-system  of  India.  To  the  virility  of 
Luther's  temper  add  the  Biblical  doctrine  of  justifi- 
cation and  you  change  completely  the  spiritual  map  of 
Europe.  Wherever  a  man  reads  the  Scriptures  with 
the  intent  to  embody  their  teachings  in  action,  there 
we  witness  the  assured  triumph  of  faith.  Without 
faith  it  is  impossible  to  win  approval,  because  without 
faith  life  is  impotent  and  vain. 

The  second  thing  which  the  Christian  puts  into  his 
church  is  mutual  interest.  Modern  finance  has  ac- 
cepted the  principle  by  employing  the  term  "  corpo- 
ration." To  incorporate  a  business  is  to  weld  its  guar- 
antors into  an  organic  system  where  whole  and  parts 
subserve  the  same  purpose.  Members  of  the  company, 
whatever  their  holdings,  have  a  common  duty  to  pro- 
mote its  welfare.     Again  the  modern  parable  inter- 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         235 

prets  the  oflSces  of  religion  with  rare  fidelity.  It  is 
easy  for  men  to  maintain  the  comity  of  trade  relations, 
inasmuch  as  personal  fortunes  are  at  stake.  It  is  easy 
in  many  cases  for  a  nation  to  preserve  its  integrity 
through  an  appeal  to  the  historical  past,  the  pride  of 
position,  or  the  instinct  of  self-defense.  But  how  dif- 
ficult it  is  for  Christian  brethren  to  hold  the  faith  in 
love  unriven  is  attested  by  a  hundred  dismal  pages  in 
the  chronicles  of  the  church.  Shall  the  incidentals  of 
creed  divide?  Scientific  men  of  the  most  diverse 
schools  have  no  hesitation  in  submitting  their  views 
to  a  common  gathering  for  severe  and  impartial  exam- 
ination. Shall  liturgical  tests  disturb?  Artists  whose 
work  is  as  far  apart  as  the  exact  technique  of  LeFevre 
and  the  subtle  suggestion  of  Impressionism  find  a  com- 
mon studio  for  consultation.  Is  church  polity  a  bar  to 
union?  Statesmen  espousing  antithetical  views  of  civil 
government  sink  all  differences  in  the  face  of  an  over- 
whelming danger.  Why  must  the  church  be  menaced 
by  a  thrust  to  the  heart  so  soon  as  a  few  men,  moved 
by  judgments  perhaps  as  yet  immaturely  framed,  sound 
a  strong  discordant  note? 

The  answer  is,  the  average  church  member  has  not 
learned  the  meaning  of  mutual  interest.  The  interest 
of  the  Christian  corporation  is  not  my  interest,  nor  my 
family's  interest,  nor  my  denomination's  interest,  nor 
the  interest  of  the  church  in  my  own  nation.  It  is 
these  and  all  other  particular  interests  rolled  into  one. 
If  Paul  had  so  elected  he  could  have  split  the  Corin- 
thian Church  wide  open  by  denouncing  in  turn  each 
party  as  traitors,  and  holding  his  own  policies  to  be 
the  full  residuum  of  evangelical  truth.  Was  that  his 
course?  He  could  never  have  reconciled  such  a  course 
with  the  responsibilities  of  leadership.    What  did  he 


236  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

do?  He  showed  the  impossibility  of  dividing  the  Gos- 
pel; he  exposed  the  vanity  of  human  slogans;  he 
taught  the  need  of  cooperation,  the  enduring  worth 
of  the  principle  of  individual  liberty,  the  beauty  of 
morality  bathed  in  the  glow  of  religious  consecration, 
the  impressiveness  of  the  common  service  at  the  Holy 
Table,  and  the  coordination  of  divine  gifts  in  the  con- 
duct of  the  church.  Then  when  his  precepts  had  been 
pressed  home  the  apostle's  loyalty  burst  out  in  the 
glowing  apostrophe  of  love,  whose  poetic  lilt  and  fine 
spiritual  fervor  have  held  enthralled  the  Christian  mind 
from  his  day  to  our  own.  He  passed  beyond  the  bounds 
of  empirics  and  stood  before  the  gate  of  the  future. 
Love  cannot  die.  Its  terms  are  not  exhausted  by  the 
quivering  codes  of  earthly  morals.  That  which  is 
natural  expires  as  a  moth  in  the  candle's  flame.  But 
spiritual  valuer  are  interpreted  by  a  higher  destiny. 
If  Jesus  lives  again  the  men  for  whose  regeneration  He 
died  cannot  find  their  permanent  expression  in  the 
tomb.  Life  is  reinforced  with  the  warrant  of  love;  it 
cannot  be  consumed;  it  is  proof  against  change  and 
decay.  To  the  unfading  life  of  love  the  Christian  in- 
vestor is  beneficiary,  and  with  him  every  believer  who 
has  sunk  his  treasure  in  the  same  mine  of  hope. 

Where,  then,  is  room  for  division,  since  interests  are 
common?  Shall  the  church  take  pride  in  her  specific 
variances  just  to  show  the  strength  of  her  nature? 
Shall  she  covet  the  grim  stains  of  sin  in  order  that 
grace  may  lavishly  abound?  If  there  were  no  other 
reason  why  the  guarantors  of  a  corporation  should 
stand  together,  a  convincing  one  would  be  found  in  the 
unrelenting  competition  immediately  before  its  steps. 
Competition  is  no  less  keen  in  the  sphere  of  religion. 
Sensuous  prizes,  commercial  engrossment,  the  scorn 


A  LEGITIMATE  CORPORATION         237 

and  contempt  of  many  scientific  inquirers,  the  slug- 
gish temper  of  the  social  conscience — environed  by 
these  can  the  church  of  Jesus  divide  her  thought  and 
paralyze  her  zeal  by  petty  bickerings  over  creed  or 
ritual  ?  The  world  is  by  no  means  subject  as  yet  to  the 
lure  of  the  Cross.  Millions  of  men  have  never  even 
heard  the  name  of  Christ.  Millions  more  have  a  mis- 
taken sentiment  respecting  Him.  The  civilization  of 
Christian  countries  is  at  times  so  near  to  collapse 
that  anxious  minds  lift  a  prayer  for  some  new  revela- 
tion of  power.  The  impending  battle  is  not  within  the 
borders  of  the  church  but  far  away  in  the  heart  of 
paganism.  We  cannot  afford  to  expose  our  own  weak- 
ness. We  need  every  ounce  of  strength  to  send  the 
whole  momentum  of  Christian  consecration  straight 
into  the  arena  where  war  for  social  redemption  shall 
be  fought  out.  Mutual  interest  dictates  the  mode  and 
degree  of  our  responsibility.  To  implicit  faith  in  God 
the  devout  disciple  must  add  uncompromising  fidelity 
to  his  fellows. 


XV. 
THE  DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES 

John  14 :24.    "  The  word  which  ye  hear  is 
not  mine  but  the  Father's  which  sent  me." 

THE  problem  of  inspiration  is  perennial.  It  has 
hewn  a  tortuous  path  through  the  controver- 
sial discussions  of  the  church.  If  the  sensitive- 
ness of  common  faith  had  been  more  rationally  trained 
many  vexatious  turns  of  the  problem  might  have  been 
avoided.  From  the  very  inception  two  parties  have 
broken  ground  in  this  fallow  field.  Some  have  said 
that  the  church  alone  can  certify  to  the  character  of 
the  Scripture.  The  church  is  a  divinely  constituted 
body.  It  has  received  from  the  Lord  the  keys  of  heaven 
and  the  grave.  Its  will  is  authoritative.  From  the 
first  its  solemn  duty  has  been  to  determine  which  of 
the  traditional  doctrines  were  truly  inspired,  and  which 
were  the  pious  utterances  of  believers.  Therefore  the 
Bible  does  not  exist  except  as  the  rescript  of  the  liv- 
ing church. 

Against  this  high  doctrine  the  second  party  has 
registered  its  protest.  The  church,  such  say,  is  not  the 
parent  but  the  child  of  the  Holy  Scripture.  The  nature 
of  the  sacraments,  the  function  of  the  ministry,  the 
contents  of  the  creeds  can  be  learned  only  by  contact 
with  the  sacred  text.  If  the  idea  of  the  church  had 
not  been  carefully  defined  in  the  historical  writings 
all  knowledge  of  a  spiritual  community  would  have 
vanished  from  the  earth.    The  church  does  not  make 

238 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       239 

the  Bible,  the  Bible  stands  sponsor  for  the  church. 
Because  of  this  relation  no  group  of  men  calling  them- 
selves the  "  Church  "  can  constitute  a  council  or  adopt 
particular  oracles  as  its  ecumenical  program.  To 
pretend  that  inspiration  tarries,  spins  itself  as  an 
ethereal  notion  in  the  human  mind,  until  Cyril  of 
Carthage  proclaims  the  order  and  number  of  the  in- 
spired books,  is  to  put  the  Scriptures  on  the  level  with 
the  Pandects  of  Justinian  or  the  decrees  of  the  Coun- 
cil of  Trent.  A  book  is  divine  not  because  men  have 
ordained  it  so  to  be,  but  because  the  God  of  truth  has 
passed  His  precepts  through  the  medium  of  certain 
selected  minds. 

Thus,  two  currents  have  contended  for  the  mastery. 
Which  is  right?  The  controversy  has  never  been  set- 
tled. It  is  open  today  as  it  was  in  the  times  of  Ter- 
tullian  or  Calvin.  Do  we  need  to  settle  it?  Is  it 
possible  that  inquirers  have  approached  the  matter 
from  a  mistaken  angle?  No  question  can  ever  receive 
a  conclusive  answer  by  trying  to  square  it  with  a 
ready-made  hypothesis.  The  assumption  lying  beneath 
each  doctrine  is  pretty  nearly  the  same.  The  Bible 
is  viewed  as  a  sacrosanct  volume  to  be  judged  quite 
apart  from  the  common  issues  of  human  thought.  It  is 
a  carbon  copy  of  the  mind  of  God,  not  a  transcript 
of  bitter  struggles  through  which  aspiring  souls  have 
passed.  It  is  a  book  which  when  printed  is  placed  on 
your  table  among  other  products  of  the  press,  but 
which  you  do  not  touch  save  with  consecrated  hands, 
lest  somehow  its  potential  threats  suddenly  thrust  their 
thongs  into  your  life. 

I  propose  to  treat  the  Bible  as  I  treat  my  Shake- 
speare, putting  to  it  the  same  queries  I  am  justified  in 
asking  any  book  that  seeks  my  suffrage. 


240  JOHN  FOURTEEN 


In  the  first  place,  I  inquire  what  the  book  says  about 
itself.  It  is  definitely  on  record  what  men  have  said 
about  the  book.  No  book  in  all  the  libraries  of  crit- 
icism has  been  subject  to  such  ingenious  tests,  furnaces 
heated  seven  times  hot.  If  the  Homeric  poems  had 
been  torn  and  mangled  with  one-tenth  of  the  critical 
fury,  their  meager  shreds  of  genuineness  would  long 
since  have  wholly  vanished.  Homer  would  be  an  empty 
name.  But  despite  such  savage  attacks  the  deeper 
feelings  of  the  student  have  been  plumbed.  That  fa- 
mous skeptic  of  France,  Ernest  Renan,  has  found  in 
Jewish  and  Christian  histories  the  vibrant  joy  of  six- 
teen centuries.  With  an  effectiveness  amazing  in  view 
of  the  insignificant  contribution  of  many  other  works, 
they  have  ameliorated  men's  ills,  shed  comfort  upon 
the  despairing,  cheered  on  the  weak  and  held  aloft 
the  symbol  of  providence  in  a  science-struck  world. 
Thomas  Huxley  writes  in  the  same  vein.  Religious 
feeling,  says  he,  is  requisite  as  the  basis  of  conduct. 
Where  shall  we  look  for  a  true  and  adequate  com- 
pound of  faith  and  right  living,  if  not  in  the  Bible? 
Let  the  Biblical  ideals  be  dissipated  and  the  race  of 
men  will  be  forced  to  the  brink  of  moral  bankruptcy. 
Thinkers  like  these  cherish  no  sympathy  with  the 
Christian  scheme  of  redemption.  They  cannot,  how- 
ever, restrain  the  words  of  admiration  that  rush  in- 
stinctively to  their  lips. 

We  know,  too,  what  men  of  deep  religious  experience 
have  said  about  the  book.  Very  few  authors  in  his 
generation  stimulated  the  pulse  of  public  thought  as 
Carlyle  did — a  social  fire,  a  cutting  sword,  the  fiaming 
hierarch  of  righteousness.     In  the  heat  of  Carlylean 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       241 

emotion  suggesting  a  return  to  the  elementary  faith  of 
the  fathers,  he  exclaims,  "  It  is  the  one  book,  wherein  for 
thousands  of  years  the  spirit  of  man  has  found  light 
and  nourishment,  and  a  response  to  what  was  deepest 
in  his  heart."  Again,  from  the  subtle  brooding  of  his 
mind  on  the  exercises  of  human  genius,  John  Milton 
turns  to  the  study  of  the  book.  What  songs,  he  asks, 
are  like  the  songs  of  Zion?  what  moral  precepts  so 
masterful  in  scope  and  reach  as  the  utterances  of  the 
prophets?  what  system  of  statecraft  so  clear,  so  com- 
prehensive, so  efficacious  as  that  taught  by  Moses  and 
Christ?  We  are  not  surprised  that  valiant  souls, 
Richard  the  Lion-hearted,  Cromwell,  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus,  Lincoln,  should  forget  the  imageries  of  bard  and 
novelist  in  the  glorious  sweep  of  faith  as  unfolded  in 
this  book. 

Yet  it  is  not  the  appraisement  of  readers  that  we 
seek,  it  is  the  book's  idea  of  itself.  The  average  author 
preludes  his  work  with  a  studied  explanation  of  what 
he  means  to  do.  Sometimes  you  may  read  the  whole 
book  in  the  preface,  and  sometimes  you  find  nothing  of 
its  heart  there.  How  runs  the  current  of  this  volume? 
No  preface  is  needed  to  convey  the  sentiment  of  the 
whole.  On  every  page  even  in  that  shrine  of  literary 
grace  where  the  name  of  God  is  not  mentioned — even 
in  the  story  of  Esther  the  voice  of  the  divine  Author  is 
heard.  The  peculiarity  of  the  Bible  is  that  every 
writer  declines  to  accept  responsibility  for  his  words. 
In  strictly  human  documents  brilliant  trope  and  highly 
developed  dialetics  are  carefully  nurtured  as  our  own 
creations.  No  parent,  whatever  his  social  grade,  is  so 
glaringly  proud  of  his  own  child  as  the  successful 
author.  Here  the  practice  is  reversed.  To  another  the 
authority  of  all  sentiments  is  ascribed.    There  is  no 


242  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

uncertainty.  "  God  spake  all  these  words  saying  " — 
with  this  warrant  Moses  ordains  the  mightiest  code 
of  morals  ever  flung  at  the  conscience  of  the  world. 
"  Thou  hast  magnified  thy  word  above  all  thy  name  " 
— the  triumphs  of  military  power  are  not  to  be  com- 
pared with  the  persuasions  of  truth.  "  Thus  saith  the 
Lord  " — Isaiah  brings  direct  from  heaven  a  new  at- 
testation of  the  ancient  covenant.  "  The  word  of  the 
Lord  came  unto  Jeremiah  the  prophet " — a  whole  book 
blazes  with  commands,  entreaties,  adjurations,  and 
assurances,  whose  electric  phrase  an  untouched  poet 
would  seek  in  vain  to  reproduce.  These  men  did  not 
speak  of  their  own  volition;  they  were  caught  in  the 
currents  of  supernatural  truth,  so  that  a  later  ob- 
server would  impressively  declare,  "  Holy  men  of  God 
spoke  as  they  were  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost."  Even 
Jesus  did  not  disdain  to  be  known  as  the  purveyor, 
not  the  author  of  truth.  The  sentences  now  affecting 
so  profoundly  the  emotions  of  the  disciples  were  tides 
in  the  great  deep  of  revelation.  He  did  not  start  them 
by  His  own  impulse. 

But  sentences  bursting  with  such  extraordinary 
energy  can  apply  only  to  the  passing  generation,  like 
the  sap  that  floods  the  branches  of  a  tree  and  having 
brought  forth  flower  and  fruit  returns  again  upon  it- 
self. Words,  men  argue,  are  unable  to  communicate 
the  flash  of  power  to  dry  and  dusty  parchment  for  the 
edification  of  future  readers.  Who  would  venture  to 
confine  the  magnetic  forces  of  nature  within  the  hand- 
made dynamo?  Yet  just  this  thing  has  been  done. 
Language,  which  is  the  crown  of  human  endowments, 
serves  as  the  channel  of  eternal  verities.  The  Bible  is 
careful  to  affirm  that  its  earlier  oracles  are  girt  with 
enduring  value ;  they  can  be  embodied  in  written  form. 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       243 

In  the  mature  hour  of  Hebrew  thought  when  poetic 
fervor  bows  to  the  yoke  of  literary  artifice,  the  Exilic 
writer  frames  an  acrostic  of  rare  beauty  testifying  to 
the  sacredness  of  the  Law  and  Prophets.  "  Thy  word," 
he  recites — and  the  lightnings  of  Sinai  rage  again 
about  the  Torah — "  Thy  word  is  a  lamp  unto  my  feet 
and  a  light  unto  my  path."  Remember,  it  is  not  what 
God  at  that  moment  is  speaking  to  exiled  heroes,  who 
in  the  bravery  of  despair  have  turned  to  Him  for  help ; 
it  is  the  word  which  though  long  time  buried  is  at 
length  revealed  to  the  sons  of  men  for  their  perpetual 
use.  The  word  of  God  becomes  a  Scripture,  attested 
by  the  signature  of  His  hand.  It  is  not  a  congeries  of 
disconnected  oracles  but  a  generic  whole.  Its  coher- 
ence is  so  marked  that  New  Testament  men  can  aver, 
if  we  violate  a  single  commandment  we  have  dis- 
honored the  entire  ten.  Its  authority  is  conclusive; 
Paul  has  no  fear  to  argue  that  all  Scripture  is  breathed 
by  God.  Finally,  the  Lord  Himself  with  no  secular 
idolatry  for  letter  and  time  establishes  the  claim  of 
the  Book  by  saying,  "  The  Scriptures  cannot  be 
broken."  The  separate  oracles  caught  up  by  open 
minds,  as  messages  may  be  caught  by  the  skilled  wire- 
less operator,  have  now  been  coordinated  into  a  per- 
manent system  of  truth.  This  system  of  truth  we  call 
the  Bible. 


II 

The  first  witness  to  its  unusual  character  is  its 
own  assertion  of  divine  authorship.  But  Christianity 
is  not  alone  in  possessing  an  acute  sense  of  revelation. 
Other  faiths,  notably  the  Moslem,  repose  the  same 
confidence  in  their  sacred  volumes.     Hence  we  dare 


244)  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

not  stop  at  this  point,  since  unsupported  the  Bible's 
claim  may  be  as  erroneous  as  theirs. 

Let  us  go  a  step  further  and  examine  the  manner  of 
its  composition.  Influences  are  at  work  here  quite 
unlike  those  which  contribute  to  the  making  of  a  nor- 
mal literary  product.  The  book  under  review  is  on  its 
face  not  one  continuous  narrative  but  a  group  of  sixty- 
six  units  correlated  in  two  grand  divisions.  Thirty-five 
hands,  at  least,  have  wrought  in  shaping  its  structural 
form.  Thirty-five  minds  have  written  down  the  dom- 
inant thoughts  of  their  day.  For  this  reason  we  should 
expect  to  meet  a  welter  of  religious  interests,  a  con- 
flict of  sesthetie  sentiments,  an  unorganized  variety  of 
moral  attitudes.  We  are  surprised  to  find  ourselves 
carried  along  by  one  prevailing  wind,  the  spiritual 
vane  pointing  consistently  to  the  theme  of  divine 
Redemption.  It  is  not  against  habit  to  seek  a  common 
thesis  and  a  characteristic  style  in  the  works  of  human 
genius.  Could  you  mistake  the  shrewd  insight  of  Plato 
in  the  several  sections  of  his  "  Republic  "  ?  Does  not 
the  very  choice  of  words  in  far-flung  paragraphs  recall 
his  versatile  use  of  language?  Thought  and  diction 
weld  the  classic  into  a  scientific  unity.  But,  you  say, 
documents  have  borne  the  impress  of  a  variety  of 
minds  without  yielding  in  any  particular  their  whole- 
ness of  thought.  The  American  Constitution  is  a  case 
in  point, — the  most  remarkable  instrument,  writes  Mr. 
Gladstone,  ever  struck  from  the  human  mind  by  a 
single  effort.  I  answer,  many  mental  attitudes,  a  host 
of  divergent  emotions,  entered  into  its  formation,  but 
over  all  and  penetrating  all  was  the  Colonists'  aspi- 
ration for  liberty,  a  chance  to  govern  themselves 
according  to  the  dictates  of  a  common  conscience.  This 
sense  of  unity  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  a  few  weeks 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       245 

only  sufiSced  to  register  the  will  of  the  people  in  their 
new  organic  law. 

Both  tests  of  unity — of  time  and  mind — fail  in  the 
issue  before  us.  Let  us  examine  the  career  of  the 
Bible  as  respects  each.  Fourteen  hundred  years  were 
traversed  in  completing  its  circle.  For  us  humans  time 
is  not  mere  motion,  the  turning  of  the  earth  on  its 
axis,  the  checking  of  days  on  the  calendar;  time  is  a 
series  of  atmospheres.  Migrations  of  races  register 
the  changing  complexion  of  thought.  To  resist  such 
change  is  to  clog  or  stop  the  wheels  of  time.  On  the 
brink  of  the  twentieth  century  China,  forty  centuries 
old,  is  still  China  as  Confucius  knew  it,  and  his  an- 
tecedents for  uncounted  generations.  It  is  a  psychic 
unit.  The  Bible  has  its  unity  not  because  it  has 
declined  to  pass  through  converting  media  but  because, 
passing  through  these,  it  has  charged  each  successive 
era  with  its  own  spiritual  purpose.  Thus,  you  may 
find  in  the  early  pages  of  the  book  certain  definite 
traces  of  the  ritualistic  feeling  of  Egypt.  Scientific 
research  has  elicited  the  fact  that  by  the  waters  of  the 
Nile  religion  had  ensconced  itself  in  a  bed  of  liturgies, 
which  for  beauty,  adroitness  and  purposive  form  are 
without  a  parallel  in  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  the 
world.  Could  human  inspiration  fall  within  its  at- 
mospheric glow  and  be  dumb  to  the  values  of  such 
spiritual  habits? 

Then  pass  beyond  the  spell  of  city  life  and  sojourn 
among  the  hills  of  Canaan.  Shall  contact  with 
heaven's  burning  orb,  with  the  crashing  forces  of 
nature,  with  the  needs  of  body  supplied  by  the  fruit  of 
the  earth  and  tree,  leave  the  soul  untrammeled,  free, 
unresponsive  to  One  who  has  formed  and  energized 
them  all?    Religiqn  assumes  a  new  bent.    Instead  of 


246  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

gorgeous  ritual,  the  smoking  altar  and  the  fragrant 
incense  beget  a  more  personal  relation  with  God.  Later 
still  the  Bible  carries  us  forward  to  the  giant-types  of 
despotic  government.  We  hear  the  clash  of  arms,  the 
rattle  of  swords,  the  tramp  of  mustered  troops.  The 
world  is  now  a  military  camp.  The  mark  of  progress 
is  the  defeat  of  empires.  Nineveh,  Assyria,  Babylon, 
Persia,  lay  their  hands  upon  the  spirits  of  the  good. 
Not  what  men  can  think  or  feel  but  what  they  can  do 
by  sheer  might  of  body  becomes  the  index  of  genius. 
The  sacred  books  are  vibrant  with  the  issues  of  the 
new  conflict.  Shall  the  soul  or  the  body  conquer? 
Through  the  torrential  rains  of  grim  brutality  the 
prophets  make  their  way  to  the  front,  bearing  aloft  the 
hopes  of  humanity. 

Again  the  scene  is  staged  for  a  better  era.  The 
culture  of  Greece  emerges,  the  flower  of  intellect  blos- 
soms in  unprecedented  grace.  Kings  and  dynasties 
disappear  from  view.  In  their  stead  enter  the  philos- 
ophers and  poets  of  the  West.  To  think  one's  way  to 
glory  is  the  business  of  the  new  dispensation.  Not  to 
accept  the  authority  of  the  ancients  but  to  prove  all 
things  and  hold  fast  that  which  is  good  becomes  the 
watchword  of  success.  If  Jesus  Christ  was  crucified, 
died,  and  rose  again  the  third  day,  the  fact  can  rest 
not  alone  upon  the  promises  of  Scripture  but  also  upon 
the  testimony  of  competent  witnesses.  The  mode  of 
thought  is  Aristotelian;  example  must  support  the 
principle.  Mere  intuition  will  not  do.  The  Bible  has 
been  carried  into  the  laboratory  of  scientific  ex- 
perience. 

Yet  even  this  is  not  enough;  it  must  be  married  to 
conduct;  the  scheme  of  law  conceived  in  Rome  must 
lay  its  convincing  maxims  upon  the  sacred  text.    The 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       247 

atmosphere  is  distinctly  new.  Never  before  have  the 
men  of  Scripture  stood  face  to  face  with  the  idea  of  a 
juridical  settlement  of  religious  cases.  The  world  was 
confronted  by  a  revolutionary  dogma.  The  will  of  the 
individual  is  no  longer  supreme;  it  has  been  incor- 
porated into  a  legal  system.  Imperial  power  lies  not 
in  armament  or  invincible  eagles.  These  are  obsolete. 
Power  has  passed  from  Caesar's  court  to  the  court  of 
justice.  A  case  will  be  tried  on  its  merits,  and  the 
humblest  citizen  like  Paul  will — barring  accidents- 
have  as  good  a  chance  for  impartial  judgment  as  the 
richest  Senator.  To  say  that  Paul's  mind  was  over- 
whelmed by  the  new  idea  is  to  record  an  exact  historic 
fact.  If  you  need  supporting  evidence  read  again 
the  fifth  chapter  to  the  Roman  church.  To  be  justi- 
fied by  faith  is  to  have  the  system  of  divine  jurispru- 
dence faithfully  administered  for  my  personal  benefit. 

It  is  thus  that  the  Bible  has  come  under  the  influ- 
ence of  contradictory  civilizations.  With  what  results? 
When  the  Teutonic  tribes  forced  their  way  into  Gaul 
they  brought  a  new  type  of  mind,  a  new  form  of  social 
organization.  Did  they  keep  them  unaltered?  Fer- 
rero  has  shown  with  adroitness  how  Caesar's  armies 
arrived  in  Gaul  to  find  not  a  barbarous  waste  but  the 
substantial  marks  of  a  Romanized  civic  life.  The  im- 
perial idea  of  progress  was  regnant  there.  Such  an 
alembic  has  the  Bible  been  to  the  hopes  of  men.  It 
has  seized  upon  temperaments  and  social  habits,  and 
surcharged  them  with  a  single  purpose.  Time  has  not 
destroyed  the  unity  of  the  volume.  It  has  rather  sub- 
dued the  diversities  of  race  to  the  intrinsic  promise  of 
Redemption. 

The  other  test  of  unity  is  intellectual.  If  revelation 
can  come  only  by  the  medium  of  mind  shall  we  not  run 


248  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  risk  of  losing  a  spectrum  through  some  flaw  in  the 
glass?  The  risk  would  be  fatal  to  other  social  inter- 
ests. It  is  not  so  here,  and  the  reason  must  be  sought 
in  an  influence  beyond  the  customary  experiences  of 
the  world.  For  consider  the  types  of  mind  in  the 
Bible.  I  can  present  them  best  by  a  pageant  of  con- 
trasts. You  perceive  at  once  the  differences  of  attain- 
ment in  the  field  of  learning.  Divine  wisdom  has  never 
limited  religious  progress  to  the  culture  of  the  school. 
Nor  on  the  other  hand  have  uninstructed  men  been  re- 
garded as  the  only  available  wires  for  the  inspired 
current.  Moses  and  Amos,  the  scholar  of  Egypt  and 
the  shepherd  of  Tekoa,  are  equally  smitten  with  pro- 
phetic power.  The  cultivated  eloquence  of  Deuteron- 
omy vies  with  the  rough  language  of  the  hillside  in 
communicating  the  message  of  truth.  No  less  extreme 
is  the  contrast  between  men  in  their  social  relations. 
The  king  on  his  throne  hymns  the  glories  of  religion 
no  less  feelingly  than  the  obscure  bard  whose  Canticles 
never  fail  to  awake  the  secret  affections  of  the  church. 
The  principle  is  irresistible.  You  cannot  by  conven- 
tional usage  bind  the  subtle  forces  of  the  mind. 
Aurelius  and  Epictetus,  emperor  and  slave,  find  kin- 
ship in  the  spontaneous  expression  of  soul. 

I  note  again  a  cleavage  in  the  religious  practice  of 
men.  Who  could  be  further  apart  in  vision  than 
yonder  priest,  the  exponent  of  an  ecclesiastical  sys- 
tem, and  the  prophet  on  the  mountaintop,  free  as  the 
air  he  breathes,  expatiating  on  wings  of  fancy  up  to 
the  cloudland  of  faith?  Yet  these  two  men,  Ezekiel 
and  Isaiah,  give  utterance  to  a  single  refrain.  Two 
sparkling  gems  of  Hebrew  history,  the  Kings  and  the 
Chronicles,  created  the  one  by  the  seer,  the  other  by 
the  hand  of  priestly  art,  make  no  dispute  over  the  fun- 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       249 

damental  theme  that  God  will  redeem  His  people.  Then 
to  clinch  our  argument  we  compare  the  moral  fiber 
before  it  is  touched  by  social  habit  and  which  despite 
the  sear  of  contact  persists  unchanged.  There  is  Ne- 
hemiah,  a  man  of  affairs,  a  man  born  to  the  executive's 
task.  He  is  chamberlain  to  the  king,  he  is  governor 
of  the  devastated  city  of  his  people.  He  has  the  busi- 
ness instinct.  No  man  can  pull  the  wool  over  his  eyes; 
no  shrewd  politician  can  deceive  his  analytic  mind. 
Compare  Nehemiah  with  the  patriarch  Job,  a  silent 
observer,  a  student  of  deep  reflection,  a  proprietary 
gentleman  who  could  sit  down  and  think.  These  two 
men  inspired  by  intercourse  with  their  kind  send  out 
rich  caravans  of  wisdom  to  the  world  at  large.  Though 
far  apart  in  time  and  disposition  they  seek  to  unfold 
the  precise  thoughts  which  have  found  utterance  in 
every  oracle  of  revelation. 

How  shall  we  account  for  the  kinship  of  theme? 
The  fact  is  impressive.  Scholars  whose  sympathies 
are  alien  from  the  Christian  scheme  have  admitted  its 
reality.  The  hypothesis  of  evolution,  the  psychology  of 
imitation,  have  been  called  in  to  explain  it.  The  mys- 
tery remains  unsolved.  Conflicting  attitudes  of  mind 
and  conduct  confront  us  on  the  pages  of  Holy  Writ; 
yet  unity  is  distilled  from  their  contact.  I  can  read  a 
parable  in  the  building  of  the  Cologne  Cathedral.  In 
the  fourteenth  century  its  foundations  were  laid  under 
the  superintending  genius  of  a  great  German  architect. 
During  the  next  century  substantial  additions  were 
made  to  the  edifice.  Then  the  work  ceased.  For  more 
than  three  hundred  years  the  stones  lay  cold  and  silent 
and  the  prayers  of  its  devout  founders  went  un- 
answered. With  the  renascence  of  national  feeling 
sequent  to  the  remarkable  ferment  of  mind,  Germany 


250  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

awoke  to  the  fact  that  her  noblest  dream  was  not  yet 
fulfilled.  She  sought  and  found  an  artist  who  could 
enter  into  the  subtle  feeling  of  the  first  artificer.  To 
him  the  task  was  committed  and  by  the  aid  of  popular 
enthusiasm  the  vast  pile  rose  in  splendor  till  its  two 
spires  pointed  their  way  into  the  sky  of  realized  hope. 
By  close  observation  you  can  see  today  the  several 
strata  of  the  edifice.  Yet  you  forget  its  diversified 
forms  in  the  commanding  unity  of  the  whole.  How 
shall  we  account  for  the  genius  of  the  building  save 
by  the  religious  sentiment  which  in  some  undefined 
way  has  dominated  the  history  of  the  nation? 

If  the  Bible  be  one  in  its  theme  and  purpose,  as  I 
believe,  the  sole  answer  you  can  give  to  the  question 
we  have  asked  is  that  the  spirit  of  wisdom  has  guided 
the  conception  of  every  part,  stripping  centuries  of 
their  antagonisms  and  welding  men's  individual  tastes 
into  loyalty  to  an  overshadowing  mind. 


Ill 

The  third  query  we  put  to  a  successful  book  is,  What 
is  its  subject-matter?  What  line  of  argument  engages 
the  attention  of  the  reader?  The  Bible,  we  hold,  is  not 
a  book  of  magic  and  should  not  be  judged  by  extraor- 
dinary standards.  It  is  a  pious  blunder  to  draw  the 
circle  of  supersanctity  about  its  text  and  warn  off 
all  scholarly  inquiry.  The  problem  of  critical  study  is 
as  to  what  the  Bible  actually  says.  I  am  not  con- 
cerned in  the  first  instance  with  Homer's  personality. 
The  Iliad  may  or  may  not  have  crystallized  in  the 
mind  of  an  Ionic  poet  with  this  familiar  name.  Nor 
am  I  eager  to  uncover  the  poetic  devices — figures, 
similes,  types  of  character — which  shine  resplendently 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       251 

in  his  verses.  These  are  important  but  they  are  not 
germane  to  the  real  issue.  What  interests  the  student 
of  classical  literature  is  the  noble  theme  carried  tri- 
umphantly through  twenty-four  books,  the  endeavor 
to  right  an  ancient  wrong  by  the  just  punishment  of 
the  offender.  When  careful  study  has  elucidated  the 
theme,  then  by  instinct  we  return  to  the  person  of 
the  author,  questing  for  the  genius  that  has  created 
the  imperishable  Epic.  In  like  manner  we  examine 
the  fabric  of  the  Bible.  What  is  the  content  of  the 
Word?  If  Jesus  asked  for  it  so  must  we.  And  as 
soon  as  we  have  made  discovery  our  judgment  shall 
be  as  His  was,  "  The  word  which  ye  hear  is  not  mine 
but  the  Father's  which  sent  me." 

I  find  three  inimitable  doctrines  emblazoned  on  the 
page.  We  begin  with  the  doctrine  of  God.  You  must 
not  expect  a  scientific  treatment  such  as  Parmenides 
tried  to  give  to  the  One  and  the  All.  Hebrew  reflection 
is  not  metaphysical,  it  has  the  concreteness  of  youth. 
It  works  by  symbols.  For  this  reason  it  develops 
truths  which  the  simplest  child  can  lay  hold  of,  whose 
luster  does  not  grow  dim  even  for  the  experience  of 
age.  The  God  of  the  Bible  enters  our  history  as  a 
unified  Being.  He  has  never  been  divided  into  Baal 
and  Astaroth.  He  has  declined  to  share  his  majesty 
with  eleven  coordinates  in  the  Greek  pantheon.  "  Hear, 
O  Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  is  one  Lord."  His  impact 
upon  human  life  is  that  of  integration.  A  divided  God- 
head inevitably  puts  the  interests  of  worshippers  in  con- 
flict. If  you  desire  the  gift  of  eloquence  from  Hermes, 
of  military  prowess  from  Mars,  the  habits  of  love  from 
Venus,  and  the  merits  of  wisdom  from  Zeus,  how,  we 
ask,  can  you  pay  a  concentrated  devotion  to  these, 
especially  if  the  gifts  of  one  countervail  the  allot- 


252  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ments  of  another?  The  vanity  of  distributed  worship 
was  deduced  by  Socrates  who  sought  the  oracle  of  his 
conscience  for  ultimate  guidance.  This  is  the  primary 
teaching  of  the  Bible,  that  God  in  His  essence  is  one  and 
cannot  be  broken  into  constitutive  segments. 

But  this  is  the  initial  step.  God  is  not  only  one. 
Parmenides  could  admit  that,  and  so  could  his  modern 
disciples.  God  is  a  spirit,  says  Jesus,  and  they  that 
worship  Him  must  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in  truth. 
The  second  stratum  in  the  divine  Nature  is  intelli- 
gence, to  which  somehow  the  intelligence  of  man  has 
been  affiliated.  To  see  how  far  the  Bible  has  passed 
beyond  the  imagination  of  man  you  have  but  to  com- 
pare the  concept  of  a  personal  Deity  with  the  imperial 
Being  of  the  Vedas.  Tied  and  shackled  are  men's 
souls  by  the  integuments  of  body.  Let  us  seek  release 
in  order  that  we  may  at  length  be  swallowed  up  in 
the  ocean  of  universal  substance.  Which  shall  be  ac- 
counted the  superior  doctrine,  man  living  eternally  in 
communion  with  his  Lord  or  man  losing  at  death  his 
personal  identity,  covered  only  with  the  icy  peace  of 
oblivion  ?  Nor  is  the  conception  of  modern  philosophy 
the  more  convincing — God  is  the  sum  of  cosmic  forces, 
flowing  in  the  sap  of  the  tree,  throbbing  in  the  tides 
of  ocean,  rushing  through  air  in  the  electric  flame, 
thinking  in  the  soul  of  man — God  is  everything,  God 
is  all.  What  sort  of  intercourse  can  your  fatigued 
spirit  have  with  Him? 

Then  note  a  third  constituent,  the  highest.  Mo- 
hammed had  some  insight  into  Deity  as  we  have  thus 
far  described  Him,  because  he  knew  the  Semitic  Scrip- 
tures. But  now  we  part  company  with  Mecca  and  the 
Koran.  There  is  one  God  and  He  can  reveal  Himself. 
But  when  He  is  revealed  at  Mohammed's  hands  do  you 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       253 

discover  the  glorious  emblems  of  love  that  shine  in 
Christian  truth?  Is  the  God  of  Islam — implacable, 
unyielding — the  same  Lord  who  bends  in  tender  sym- 
pathy over  His  sinful  children?  "Like  as  a  father 
pitieth  his  children,  so  the  Lord  pitieth  them  that 
fear  him  " — does  the  Koran  intone  syllables  that  vi- 
brate with  such  intelligent  consideration?  Do  you 
see  that  dust-covered  pilgrim?  He  is  handing  a  slip 
of  paper  to  a  man  of  alien  race.  "  What  are  these 
words  ?  "  his  companion  cries.  "  Does  God  pity  the 
men  of  this  earth  and  grant  them  help?  Our  Allah  is 
only  a  judge,  an  autocrat,  without  mercy  or  pardon. 
Does  your  God  love  His  children?  If  so,  then  your 
Bible  tells  what  our  Koran  has  no  hint  of."  The 
judgment  of  the  Moslem  is  correct.  The  supreme  at- 
tribute of  divinity  is  enshrined  not  in  the  books  of 
Arabia  but  in  the  sacred  texts  of  Christianity.  The 
Fatherhood  of  God  is  found  here  alone. 

Then  study  the  unique  doctrine  of  man.  To  secular 
observers  man  is  either  technically  complete  or  wholly 
depraved.  If  technically  complete  he  needs  no  change ; 
if  wholly  depraved  his  prostrations  of  body  or  chas- 
tisements of  soul  cannot  cure  him.  Christian  truth 
opens  a  new  outlook.  It  affirms  that  the  sentiments 
of  heart  are  susceptible  of  development.  It  thinks 
of  sin  as  a  wrong  attitude,  a  willfully  wrong  attitude 
towards  God.  But  sin  is  not  a  permanent  state,  it  may 
be  subdued,  it  may  be  eliminated.  The  history  of 
Israel  is  a  parable,  a  mirror  of  spiritual  regeneration. 
Scientific  pedagogy  has  demanded  for  the  child  the 
same  sort  of  psychological  treatment  which  nature 
has  granted  the  race.  If  the  comparison  be  valid,  much 
more  valid  is  the  parallel  between  Israel  and  the 
Christian  disciple.     For  as   the  polygamy,   revenge, 


254j  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

slavery,  and  polytheism  of  the  nation  were  crushed  in 
its  successive  struggles  for  national  unity,  so  for  the 
individual  every  sinful  tendency  may  be  surely 
thwarted  and  left  behind  in  the  upward  push  of  the 
spirit  towards  its  ideal. 

Observe  this  piece  of  marble.  It  was  found  by  a 
traveler  in  Greece.  He  carried  it  with  its  grime  and 
soil  to  the  Curator  of  the  British  Museum.  By  the 
skillful  application  of  chemicals  the  original  contour 
of  the  face  was  exposed.  It  was  a  specimen  of  art  con- 
ceived in  the  sublime  fancy  of  the  earlier  centuries, 
locked  by  some  hap  in  the  prison-house  of  earth,  and 
finally  restored  to  its  primitive  beauty.  The  Bible  pre- 
dicts a  change  as  decisive  as  that  in  the  heart  and 
life  of  believers.  The  visage  of  God  shall  be  recovered 
in  mortal  flesh.  Where  else  in  all  the  imagery  of  re- 
ligion or  poetry  can  you  find  a  doctrine  of  man  which 
so  faithfully  reflects  the  demands  of  science  and  at  the 
same  time  the  ardent  hopes  of  the  idealist? 

We  rise  to  the  third  level  where  God  finds  his  reve- 
lation in  the  Personality  of  Jesus.  It  is  not  the  first 
time  that  men  have  conceived  of  the  incarnation  of  a 
God,  but  it  is  the  first  and  only  time  that  men  have 
looked  upon  an  incarnation  which  in  every  respect 
squares  with  what  reason  and  expectation  demanded. 
The  fact  of  Christ  is  not  forced  suddenly  on  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  race.  In  Genesis  among  the  dim 
lights  of  man's  infancy  the  seed  of  the  woman  is  dedi- 
cated to  the  task  of  "  bruising  the  head  of  the  serpent." 
In  the  Psalms  the  Son  appears  as  a  mighty  king, 
David's  glorified  antitype.  Isaiah  pictures  Him  first 
as  the  Branch  of  Judah  fulfilling  His  mission  of  reve- 
lation, and  then  as  the  Servant  smitten  and  slain  for 
human  transgressions.    At  length  in  Malachi  He  rises 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       255 

as  the  morning  sun  with  the  balm  of  healing  in  His 
wings;  and  after  four  centuries  of  silence  the  heavens 
are  abruptly  riven,  Jesus  the  Son  of  God  appears, 
and  the  full  promise  of  redemption  is  at  hand.  He 
comes  not  simply  to  unveil  the  divine  essence  to  the 
astonishment  of  human  eyes;  He  comes  to  make  men 
good.  The  ideal  so  long  foreshadowed  is  realized  in  His 
Person,  and  through  Him  in  the  character  of  the  race. 
I  can  find  in  the  bravest  fancies  of  earth  no  anticipa- 
tion quite  so  comprehensive  as  this.  It  is  this  fact 
together  with  those  already  noted  which  impel  the 
student  of  Scripture  to  seek  an  origin  for  its  revela- 
tions beyond  the  just  claims  of  human  intelligence, 
far  away  in  the  wisdom  of  heaven. 


IV 

The  last  index  to  a  book's  value  lies  in  its  effect  on 
human  life.  Has  the  book,  we  inquire,  exerted  a  con- 
structive influence  upon  the  habits  of  thought  and 
conduct?  Sometimes  the  currents  it  has  set  in  motion 
are  visible  to  the  naked  eye.  Thus,  Mrs.  Stowe's 
classic  is  noteworthy  not  so  much  for  its  cleverness  of 
plot  or  shaping  of  characters  as  for  the  cry  of  resent- 
ment against  a  cruel  system,  which  it  awakes  in  the 
heart  of  a  nation.  Unite  it  with  one  or  two  other  public 
situations  and  you  can  account  for  the  outbreak  of 
the  Civil  War.  Follow  the  course  of  its  translations 
into  many  tongues,  and  you  will  behold  the  upshooting 
of  the  love  of  civil  liberty  under  its  magic  touch.  This 
was  a  book  which  exposed  a  moral  wrong.  It  is  no 
extravagance  to  expect  a  profounder  impression  when 
the  book  deals  with  the  wrongs  of  spirit.  Hence  we 
ask.  What  has  the  Bible  accomplished? 


256  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

It  has  given  a  new  tone  to  social  habits.  Let  us 
select  one  department.  The  jurisprudence  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race  is  a  compound  of  many  forces,  tem- 
peramental, legal,  and  empirical.  From  our  Teutonic 
antecedents  we  get  the  idea  of  assembly  for  the  trial 
of  particular  cases,  from  Roman  law  the  idea  of  fitting 
statute  to  case  with  such  precision  that  no  disability 
should  result,  from  actual  experience  we  have  learned 
that  every  man  is  innocent  before  the  law  until 
proven  guilty.  But  the  everyday  precept  of  duty 
comes  not  from  the  forest,  the  Forum,  or  the  law 
court,  but  from  the  Ten  Words  of  Moses  and  the  Chris- 
tian interpretation  of  the  same.  In  these  the  civil  hope 
of  the  world  has  been  enshrined.  Here  the  emanci- 
pation of  woman,  here  the  rights  of  the  slave,  here  the 
capacities  of  childhood  have  found  their  safest  ex- 
pression. Revenge  has  been  supplanted  by  justice  and 
imperial  condescension  by  the  noble  art  of  mercy.  The 
moral  sense  of  the  current  social  order  goes  back  in- 
evitably to  the  flame  and  smoke  of  Sinai. 

Nor  has  the  intellectual  nerve  of  mankind  been 
less  acutely  quickened.  Letters  reflect  in  some  degree 
the  sentient  thought  of  the  age.  They  make  alid  at 
the  same  time  are  made  by  the  social  spirit.  If  a  par- 
ticular theme  grips  the  mind  of  sage  or  peasant  its 
expression  in  literary  form  follows  as  a  matter  of 
course.  The  new  scruples  of  freedom  playing  on  the 
Italian  fancy  invest  Dante's  journey  through  invisible 
worlds  with  exceptional  charm.  The  Renaissance  is 
dramatically  unfolded  in  the  Divine  Comedy.  In 
what  terms?  In  the  metaphors  of  Greece?  In  Latin 
aphorisms?  No,  but  in  the  familiar  symbolism  of 
Scripture.  To  understand  the  grace  of  form  you 
might  go  to  Rome  or  to  the  groves  of  Tusculum.  There 


DIVINITY  OF  THE  SCRIPTURES       257 

you  will  find  its  noble  lineage.  But  if  you  seek  the 
heart  of  this  wondrous  poem  you  must  go  to  the  burn- 
ing plains  of  Mesopotamia  by  the  river  of  Chebar,  or 
wing  your  way  to  solitary  Patmos.  Dante  is  the 
prophet  and  apostle  of  the  new  era.  Dante  invokes 
the  muse  of  inspiration  for  the  embellishment  of  phrase 
and  figure.  Through  such  a  medium,  itself  almost  in- 
spired, the  Bible  steals  into  the  consciousness  of  the 
race,  awakes  the  sleeping  intelligence  of  Germany, 
calls  Holland  to  its  theologic  tourney  and  the  defense 
of  national  rights,  regenerates  the  social  habits  of 
England,  and  prepares  America  to  be  the  nursery  of  a 
new  race.  If  the  Bible  be  taken  from  Luther,  from 
Shakespeare,  from  Tolstoi,  and  the  poets  of  New  Eng- 
land, what,  it  must  be  asked,  have  these  men  left  to 
teach  their  kind? 

Then  study  the  influence  of  the  Bible  in  personal  ex- 
perience. The  ultimate  test  of  its  value  is  here.  Can 
the  message  it  offers  constrain  men  to  be  honest, 
create  a  broad-minded  charity  and  implant  an  ideal  of 
conduct  beyond  the  conceit  of  common  prudence?  The 
answer  is  in  the  life  of  the  Christian  believer.  We  be- 
gin to  feel  its  charm  in  childhood,  standing  by  the 
mother's  knee  as  she  reads  in  soft  tones  the  ancient 
Psalm,  "  The  Lord  is  my  shepherd,  I  shall  not  want." 
We  hear  its  challenge  in  maturer  years  when  critical 
questions  haunt  us  and  doubts  shut  out  the  zephyrs  of 
peace :  "  Let  not  your  heart  be  troubled ;  ye  believe  in 
God,  believe  also  in  me."  Finally  when  the  dews  of 
death  lie  cold  upon  the  brow  and  the  pageant  of 
worldly  interests  has  vanished  we  may  pray  to  do  as 
Daniel  Webster  did.  "  Bring  me  the  Book,"  said  he. 
"What  book?"  asked  the  attending  physician.  "The 
Bible,  the  only  Book."     They  read  aloud  the  tender 


268  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

words  of  the  Shepherd's  Psalm  until  the  fourth  verse 
was  reached,  "  Yea,  though  I  walk  through  the  valley  of 
the  shadow  of  death,  I  will  fear  no  evil;  for  thou  art 
with  me;  thy  rod  and  thy  staff  they  comfort  me." 
"  Yes,"  said  Webster,  "  that  is  true ;  they  comfort  me." 
And  with  the  words  of  inspiration  upon  his  lips  he  fell 
asleep. 

Can  the  Book  which  has  ministered  solace  to  mighty 
souls  in  the  moments  of  greatest  solemnity  be  ac- 
counted for  merely  as  the  secretion  of  ethnic  genius  or 
the  scintillation  of  extraordinary  intelligence?  The 
judgment  of  thoughtful  men  is  otherwise. 


XVI 
THE  PEDAGOGIC  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT 

JohnU:26.  "  The  Holy  Ghost  .  .  .  shall 
teach  you  all  things  and  bring  all  things  to 
your  remembrance,  whatsoever  I  have  said 
nnto  you." 

THE  oflSce  of  the  teacher  bears  an  honorable 
history  among  the  people  of  Israel.  It  makes 
its  appearance  at  the  threshold  of  the  nation's 
life  in  accordance  with  an  established  mental  law. 
Before  the  advent  of  Moses  Israel  was  a  collection  of 
tribes  possessing  certain  religious  traditions  but 
guided  wholly  by  the  judgment  of  the  chief.  That  was 
the  period  of  obedience,  represented  by  the  infancy  of 
the  child.  To  it  succeeds  the  age  of  reflection,  dim  and 
groping  at  first  yet  with  every  promise  of  future  form. 
Appeal  is  made  to  an  instructed  choice.  The  mind  is 
no  longer  chained  to  the  will  of  a  superior ;  it  is  awake 
and  active.  The  nation  begins  its  plunge  through  the 
thickets  of  the  desert.  Unforeseen  difiSculties  baffling 
the  inexperience  of  youth  call  for  a  new  type  of  lead- 
ership. The  shepherd  recedes  from  view,  the  teacher 
appears,  first  in  Moses,  then  in  a  long  line  of  suc- 
cessors. The  organic  law  of  Sinai  becomes  the  historic 
textbook.  Chieftain  and  judge,  king  and  prophet,  poet 
and  sage  conspire  to  interpret  its  truth.  In  the  proc- 
ess of  time  schools  divide  over  the  meaning  of  its 
terms.  Then  the  professional  instructor  assumes  the 
duties  of  office.    The  freedom  which  marked  the  teach- 

259 


260  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

ing  of  the  seer  is  lost  in  a  careful  subservience  to 
letter.  Zadok  has  none  of  the  abandon  of  Hosea. 
Hillel  is  a  shadowy  suggestion  of  Haggai.  To  pre- 
serve the  text  is  the  ambition  of  the  teacher.  There- 
fore his  manner  passes  into  a  proverb — "  to  speak  as  a 
scribe." 

The  new  era  opens,  the  new  order  is  imposed.  Will 
its  Interpreter  repeat  the  subtle  formalism  of  the  old? 
The  change  is  at  once  manifest.  The  timidity,  the  ser- 
vitude of  the  earlier  preceptor  is  gone.  The  Teacher 
of  Hattin  speaks  in  the  language  of  self-originated 
authority.  The  impression  upon  His  auditors  was 
electric.  There  was  no  display  of  dialectics,  no  cita- 
tions from  approved  authors,  nothing  but  the  brilliance 
of  a  personality.  Fascinated  by  His  understanding  of 
human  needs,  they  compared  His  bold  exposition  of 
common  texts  with  the  servile  repetitions  of  the  scribes. 
They  heard  His  rebuttal  of  official  charges,  and  ex- 
claimed, "  Never  man  spake  like  this  man."  They  con- 
fided to  one  another  in  the  aftermath  of  His  reappear- 
ance, "  Did  not  our  heart  burn  within  us,  while  he 
talked  with  us  by  the  way  and  while  he  opened  to  us 
the  Scriptures?"  The  sagacious  Jewish  councilor 
with  unerring  judgment  grasped  the  fundamental  mis- 
sion of  Jesus — He  was  a  teacher  come  from  God  with 
the  most  convincing  credentials  that  a  teacher  ever 
bore.  All  these  facts  prove  that  instruction  of  mind 
is  the  basic  principle  of  the  Christian  faith.  The 
ultimate  leader  of  the  religious  life  is  not  a  creed- 
maker  or  ecclesiastic  or  master  of  magic,  but  a  trained 
teacher  of  men.  Hence  the  Spirit  of  grace  who  suc- 
ceeds the  Christ  of  history  in  the  ministry  of  the 
church  is  foreshadowed  as  one  who  "  shall  teach  you 
all  things." 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  261 

What  are  the  elements  that  enter  into  the  pedagogy 
of  religion? 


We  begin  with  this,  that  the  preceptor  must  be 
acquainted  with  the  mental  habits  of  the  pupil.  The 
child  is  presented  for  guidance.  Who  is  he  and  what 
can  he  do?  Various  accounts  have  been  given  of  his 
equipment.  Take  this  from  Pestalozzi.  "  Sound  edu- 
cation," he  says,  "  stands  before  me  symbolized  by  a 
tree  planted  near  fertilizing  waters.  A  little  seed 
which  contains  the  design  of  the  tree,  its  forms  and 
proportions,  is  placed  in  the  soil.  See  how  it  germ- 
inates and  expands  into  trunk,  branches,  leaves,  flow- 
ers, and  fruit.  Man  is  similar  to  the  tree."  The  obser- 
vation of  the  sage  is  just.  Perception,  memory,  the 
making  of  concepts,  emotional  qualities  such  as  love 
and  curiosity  are  natural  capacities  wrapped  in  the 
integuments  of  mind.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  teacher 
to  surround  his  students  with  a  glow  of  thought  which 
will  develop  their  gifts  as  easily  as  a  flower  responds 
to  the  coaxing  warmth  of  the  sun.  To  do  this  he  must 
entertain  a  wholesome  respect  for  the  things  that  in- 
terest them;  he  must  determine  that  every  course  of 
study  shall  be  not  a  yoke  of  coercion  but  the  chal- 
lenge of  a  fascinating  exercise.  He  will  see  to  it  that 
instruction  comes  in  the  order  of  a  child's  suscepti- 
bility to  it.  Milk  for  the  infant,  strong  meat  for  the 
man — is  the  regimen  of  nature,  and  the  wise  preceptor 
follows  it  faithfully. 

Manifestly  Jesus  pursued  a  method  such  as  this. 
He  recognized  the  primitive  law  of  mind  that  we  rise 
to  abstract  thought  by  way  of  the  single  image.  For 
example,  while  He  taught  Nicodemus  the  profoundest 


262  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

truths  that  ever  fell  from  human  lips  He  nevertheless 
used  the  simplest  facts  of  nature — wind,  birth,  likeness 
of  kind — to  illuminate  His  message.  The  matter-of- 
fact  pupil  was  confused  at  first  and  inquired  how 
these  things  could  be.  Later  I  suspect  the  spiritual 
implications  burst  upon  his  mind  and  fed  its  eager 
hopes  for  years  to  come. 

The  principle  is  fixed  in  the  science  of  religious  edu- 
cation. For  examine  how  the  young  Pharisee  passed 
through  the  ordeal  of  conversion.  Here  was  a  student 
equipped  as  few  have  been  to  reason  His  way  out  of  the 
labyrinth  of  conflicting  doctrines.  That  He  utilized 
every  argument  in  support  of  His  former  position  the 
sixth  and  seventh  chapters  of  Romans  tell  us  clearly. 
But  the  only  conclusion  He  could  arrive  at  was  frozen 
in  the  icy  interrogatory,  "  O  wretched  man  that  I  am, 
who  shall  deliver  me  from  this  body  of  death  ?  "  The 
cry  is  upon  His  lips  a  hundred  times,  never  so  imper- 
ative as  at  the  slaughter  of  Stephen.  In  the  tides  of 
persecuting  fury  the  answer  tarried,  but  at  length  it 
rushed  forth  not  in  the  exegesis  of  texts,  not  in  the 
abstractions  of  a  creed,  not  even  in  the  cameo  language 
of  a  basic  law,  but  in  the  concrete  form  of  a  person — 
"through  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord."  The  definiteness 
of  the  reply  carries  its  own  lesson.  Great  as  Saul  of 
Tarsus  was  in  mental  equipment,  learned  as  he  proved 
himself  in  the  subtleties  of  Jewish  law,  his  new  birth 
must  be  won  in  the  way  a  child  wins  knowledge  of 
himself.  It  is  folly  for  you  to  explain  that  however 
rapidly  images  change  the  current  of  personal  feeling 
is  one.  "  I  am  I  " — is  the  inevitable  retort ;  no  further 
proof  is  needed. 

The  spiritual  Saul  came  to  himself  the  moment  he 
stood  in  the  presence  of  Jesus.    Men  always  begin  their 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  263 

career  of  faith  by  a  look  at  personalized  love.  It  is  the 
rallying  point  of  understanding.  If  I  presumed  to 
tell  an  intelligent  seeker  all  my  theories  of  the  origin, 
course  and  fulfillment  of  Redemption  I  should  at 
once  confuse  his  mind  and  prejudice  him  against  the 
religion  I  was  trying  to  expound.  Why?  Because  I 
had  failed  to  follow  the  initial  principle  of  pedagogy — 
not  rules  but  the  appropriate  example.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  put  my  inquirer  in  the  immediate  neigh- 
borhood of  the  Cross,  if  I  can  get  him  to  see  that  the 
wounds  are  real  and  the  death  scientifically  certain,  if 
I  can  induce  him  to  find  in  the  Seven  Words  evidence 
of  a  forgiving  spirit  beyond  the  habits  of  the  world, 
if  I  can  join  Christ's  sacrificial  death  to  the  patient 
self-denial  of  His  life,  then  I  shall  present  to  the  faith 
of  a  man  the  image  which  it  normally  craves.  Re- 
flection will  make  the  application  certain. 

But  the  human  mind  does  something  more  than 
react  to  its  environment.  A  machine  can  do  that.  So 
long  as  its  parts  remain  in  place  without  wear  it  will 
perform  the  same  movement  indefinitely.  Set  your 
motor  at  work,  give  it  gasoline  and  a  little  water,  and 
by  an  occasional  opening  of  the  valves  to  expel  the 
collected  air  you  can  run  your  car  with  speed  and 
comfort  for  hours  at  a  stretch.  The  soul  of  man  is  a 
more  subtle  mechanism,  as  every  teacher  knows.  It 
works,  it  works  with  amazing  regularity.  You  open 
your  eyes  and  a  flood  of  waiting  sensations  break  upon 
the  mind.  No  effort,  no  resistance — nature  follows  her 
bent !  If  the  story  were  finished  there  it  would  still  be 
one  to  startle  the  serenity  of  the  gods.  This,  however, 
is  a  bare  beginning.  The  normal  mind  expands,  grows, 
is  subject  to  progress.  What  shall  we  do  with  the 
myriad  facets  of  curiosity  which  appear  with  the  rising 


264.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

sun?  The  problem  of  education  is  acutest  at  this 
point.  The  medieval  student  had  to  pass  the  drill  of 
logic  and  rhetoric  in  order  to  be  admitted  into  the 
ranks  of  the  laureate.  Under  such  rigorous  treatment 
the  spontaneity  of  individual  impulse  evaporated. 
What  the  mind  needs  is  room — room  to  work,  room  to 
play,  room  to  discipline  its  refractory  forces.  It  is 
this  threefold  exercise  which  the  divine  Spirit  has 
adopted  in  the  training  of  conscience. 

Effort,  says  modern  pedagogy,  is  the  first  law  of  na- 
ture. With  the  skill  of  a  poet  Froebel  has  combined 
the  movement  of  hand  and  mind  in  the  act  of  learning. 
Let  these  blocks  awake  the  primitive  building  instinct. 
The  cube  broken  into  its  parts  reveals  shape,  angle, 
distance,  local  arrangement.  Before  the  pupil  is  aware 
he  has  formed  the  outline  of  a  house  and  acquired  at 
the  same  time  the  essential  axioms  of  geometry.  The 
principle  of  effort  enters  correspondingly  into  religious 
experience.  Faith  is  not  a  fruit  that  can  be  picked 
bJoom-ripe  from  the  tree.  It  must  be  carefully  nur- 
tured. It  demands  no  less  exertion  than  the  spider's 
spinning  of  her  web,  and  is  precisely  as  natural.  The 
time  was  when  theologians  counseled  the  inquirer  to 
sit  down  quietly  and  let  the  ministry  of  heaven  develop 
a  spiritual  character.  It  was  thought  to  be  a  reflec- 
tion on  the  power  of  God  to  have  a  man  add  his  mite 
to  the  sufficiency  of  salvation.  The  theory  is  mistaken. 
If  a  man  does  not  summon  every  ounce  of  energy  to 
work  out  his  own  salvation  he  will  have  a  desperately 
shrunken  soul  to  present  at  the  last  to  his  Maker. 
We  are  bound  to  employ  every  available  means — Bible, 
prayer,  church,  correctness  of  conduct,  the  duties  of 
citizenship,  hospitality,  and  a  benevolent  regard  for  the 
race — in  order  to  keep  our  spiritual  life  from  being 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  265 

more  than  a  subtle  sham.  This  is  the  tuition  of  the 
Spirit. 

The  second  form  of  activity  is  play.  Froebel  based 
his  celebrated  method  upon  the  principle  of  motor  ex- 
pression. "  Play,"  he  says,  "  is  typical  of  human  life 
as  a  whole,  of  the  hidden  natural  life  in  man  and  all 
things.  It  gives  joy,  freedom,  contentment,  inner  and 
outer  rest,  peace  with  the  world.  It  holds  the  sources 
of  all  that  is  good."  Certainly  the  games  of  childhood 
mirror  its  simple  grace  and  unaffected  delight  as 
formal  lessons  cannot.  Into  them  the  full  strength  of 
body  and  mind  is  flung,  while  from  their  zest  come  valu- 
able emotions  to  enrich  and  strengthen  the  person- 
ality. Shall  religion  decline  the  spice  and  thrill  of  rec- 
reation, the  antidote  to  care,  the  impulse  which,  when 
common  work  fails,  surely  knits  separate  souls  into 
one  fellowship?  It  is  this  which  accounts  for  the 
dance  in  primitive  worship ;  it  is  the  same  feeling  which 
today  in  the  diapason  of  song  lifts  a  great  audience  to 
the  ecstasies  of  faith,  as  the  fervent  eloquence  of  the 
preacher  can  never  do.  In  obedience  to  its  call  we 
abandon  the  fatiguing  round  of  service,  and  in  some 
sequestered  nook  hold  communion  with  nature's  visible 
forms  or  sink  into  revery  over  the  pages  of  a  com- 
pelling book.  I  am  wholly  persuaded  that  religious 
grace  steals  from  the  playtimes  of  life  into  the  secret 
haunts  of  the  soul. 

From  the  gay  we  pass  to  the  grave,  as  shadows  pur- 
sue the  sunlight  across  the  landscape.  Tuition  is  hope- 
lessly at  fault  without  the  application  of  discipline. 
Montaigne  condemned  in  sharp  tones  the  inhuman 
methods  of  this  day.  ''  Instead  of  tempting  children  to 
be  better  by  apt  and  gentle  ways,  our  pedants  present 
nothing  to  them  but  ferules    and    rods,  pain    and 


266  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

cruelty."  He  advocated  a  genial  treatment  of  pupils 
— "  green  leaves  and  fine  (lowers  rather  than  the  bloody 
stumps  of  birch  and  willow."  He  would  paint  a  school 
room  with  joy  and  gladness,  Flora  and  the  Graces, 
uniting  intellectual  profit  to  emotional  pleasure.  It  is 
true  that  we  cannot  impart  learning  at  the  crack  of 
the  lash.  The  mind  of  childhood  rebels.  Nevertheless, 
Herbert  Spencer  has  pointed  out  the  inevitable  need 
of  correction.  Nature  disciplines  her  children  by  di- 
rect and  fitting  penalties.  If  the  arm  be  not  used  it 
will  lose  its  strength.  If  the  memory  be  not  invited  to 
receive  fact  and  fancy  its  powers  of  coherence  will 
soon  disappear.  The  same  law  is  in  force  in  religion. 
He  who  declines  to  bend  his  knee  in  prayer  will  ulti- 
mately in  the  hour  of  stress  find  his  way  to  the  throne 
effectually  barred.  The  culture  of  the  Spirit  is  sharp. 
It  confronts  the  sensitive  soul  with  situations  which 
veteran  courage  might  shudder  to  meet.  It  compelled 
John  G.  Faton  to  labor  many  slow  and  lingering  years 
amid  the  most  intimate  dangers,  ere  the  first  convert 
was  won.  It  shut  up  rebellious  Saul  in  the  Damascus 
house,  sightless  and  alone;  it  sent  him  into  the  irri- 
tating solitude  of  Arabia,  forced  him  at  Jerusalem  to 
face  the  suspicious  looks  of  the  church  he  had  perse- 
cuted, and  finally,  consigned  him  to  eight  years  of  wait- 
ing at  Tarsus,  until  the  opportunity  for  service  ar- 
rived. Discipline  is  stern  but  it  attains  its  end.  What 
Paul  would  have  been  without  his  rigorous  training  we 
can  only  surmise;  what  he  became  under  its  urgent 
goad  all  the  world  knows.  To  eliminate  the  rod  of  cor- 
rection would  be  to  leave  the  Spirit's  work  crude  and 
unfinished. 

But  what  is  the  end  of  discipline,  and  what  the  end 
of  work  and  play?    Let  me  say  at  once,  its  end  is  to 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  267 

construct  perfect  Christian  manhood  by  developing  the 
resources  at  hand  in  each  particular  case.  This  does 
not  mean  that  the  spiritual  mould  is  single — a  Peter, 
an  Apollos,  a  Paul.  Thomas  k  Kempis  presents  a 
mystic  temper  so  discreet  and  penetrating  as  to  make 
him  the  ideal  character  of  his  generation.  But  this 
fact  cannot  stamp  mysticism  upon  the  church  as  the 
sole  method  of  Christian  nurture.  To  attempt  to  edu- 
cate John  KJiox  into  the  cloistered  placidity  of  the 
medieval  saint  would  be  like  changing  a  hurricane  into 
the  balmy  zephyrs  of  summer.  The  genius  of  the  divine 
Spirit  is  found  in  the  versatility  of  his  pedagogic  treat- 
ment as  respects  the  individual.  On  a  wider  field  also 
the  same  method  is  used.  Sectarian  differences  are 
regarded  by  some  as  vicious  ruptures  of  the  Lord's 
body.  From  the  earliest  moment  Christian  men  have 
disagreed  as  to  the  rules  and  habits  of  ecclesiastical 
practice;  they  had  to.  Temperament  determines  prac- 
tice, and  diversity  results.  Hence  churches  emphasize 
the  emotional  or  the  intellectual  or  the  practical  side 
of  religion — liturgy,  creed,  service.  But  neither  of 
these  by  itself  constitutes  the  church.  It  is  only  when 
they  have  been  harmoniously  joined  that  the  true  body 
of  Christ  appears.  In  precisely  this  way  the  Christian 
character  assumes  its  proper  form.  Thought,  feelings, 
will  enter  into  the  complex  of  the  spiritual  life.  By 
cultivating  each  in  turn  and  all  together  the  divine 
Teacher  moulds  His  pupils  into  the  eternal  manhood 
of  their  Lord. 

II 

We  pass  to  the  curriculum  of  religion.  In  secular 
education  the  scheme  of  studies  at  present  is  in  a  fluid 
and  fluctuating  state.    There  was  a  time  when  Latin 


268  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

and  Greek  covered  the  attainments  of  the  cultured 
gentleman.  Later,  after  a  bitter  struggle,  history  and 
the  vernacular  languages  gained  a  foothold  in  the 
schools.  Finally,  the  quarrel  narrowed  down  to  sub- 
jects which  give  drill  and  those  that  furnish  content. 
Both  types  of  knowledge  we  think  are  essential  to 
education.  The  student,  as  Spencer  contends,  should 
acquire  some  familiarity  with  the  everyday  sciences, 
but  he  should  not  spurn  the  nice  distinctions  of  logic 
or  the  abstract  values  of  mathematics. 

Fundamental  differences  have  developed  also  in  the 
school  of  religion,  and  feelings  have  been  powerfully 
stirred  by  virtue  of  a  new  need,  that  to  the  interests 
of  the  present  world  the  expectations  of  the  world 
to  come  must  be  added.  Theologians  have  wrought  out 
stratifications  of  creed,  following  the  lines  of  cleavage 
we  have  just  noted.  Since  every  one  of  these  may  be 
verified  by  Scripture,  the  advocate  of  each  regards 
himself  as  occupying  a  favorable  position.  His  mis- 
take lies  in  making  any  single  dogma  the  touchstone  of 
authority.  To  see  its  permanent  meaning  we  must 
get  the  full  text  of  Christian  truth,  and  it  is  this 
truth  which  is  embodied  in  the  message  of  the  divine 
Teacher. 

He  begins  with  the  presentation  of  Jesus.  His  in- 
structions were  foreshadowed  by  the  words  of  the 
dying  Master.  The  advent  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  in- 
separably linked  with  the  person  of  the  Lord.  The 
one  is  the  alter  ego  of  the  other.  So  long  as  the  visible 
Christ  remained  in  the  world  of  experience,  the  in- 
visible Christ  could  not  manifest  Himself  to  aching 
hearts  over  the  whole  domain  of  earthly  life.  But 
when  the  heavens  closed  about  the  escaping  Form,  then 
His  solace  and  tutelage  would  be  mediated  through 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  269 

more  spiritual  channels.  His  disciples  would  hear  not 
with  the  ear  of  the  body  but  with  the  understanding  of 
the  mind.  The  Spirit  would  descend  to  them  on  a 
mission  from  the  Father  but  in  the  name,  that  is,  with 
the  authority  of  the  Son.  The  subject  of  His  instruc- 
tion would  be  unique.  He  would  testify  of  Jesus, 
would  glorify  Jesus,  would  bring  to  their  remembrance 
all  things  whatsoever  Jesus  had  said  unto  them. 

I  am  amazed  as  I  read  again  the  circumscribed 
program.  I  could  fancy  that  when  the  church  came 
under  the  new  inspiration  it  would  have  found  a 
complete  interpretation — type  and  antitype — of  the 
ancient  order;  it  would  have  detected  the  eternal 
principles  vital  in  Moses,  David,  and  Isaiah;  it  would 
have  heard  again  the  mighty  tones  of  the  ancient 
Jehovah.  Yet  instead  of  familiar  oracles  we  are 
confronted  with  the  name  and  fame  of  Jesus.  In- 
stead of  defining  sin  in  terms  of  the  Mosaic  law, 
sin  can  now  be  determined  solely  by  a  man's  atti- 
tude towards  Jesus.  Instead  of  framing  a  righteous 
character  at  the  touch  of  noble  ritual,  a  man  can 
know  righteousness  only  after  Jesus'  obedience  to  law 
had  been  justified  by  His  personal  exaltation.  Ex- 
traordinary assumptions  like  these  are  to  be  found  in 
no  other  religious  system.  They  mark  the  writers  as 
mental  delinquents,  or  else  as  possessed  of  an 
imprescriptible  right  to  make  them.  A  middle  point 
does  not  appear.  They  stamp  themselves  as  the  more 
extraordinary  in  view  of  the  fact  that  competent  wit- 
nesses have  accepted  the  centrality  of  Jesus  as  entirely 
warranted.  When  Peter,  who  assessed  the  doctrines 
of  Judaism  with  the  skill  of  an  Aristotle,  when  John, 
who  entered  critically  into  the  Alexandrian  theory  of 
divine  emanation,  when  Paul,  who  knew  the  psychology 


270  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

of  Greece  and  applied  its  rules  to  the  primary  ques- 
tions of  conduct — when  these  and  hundreds  of  the 
same  intellectual  girth  gave  soul  and  body  to  the 
preaching  of  safety  through  faith  in  Jesus,  the  assump- 
tion of  the  Tryst-room  is  no  longer  an  isolated  hyper- 
bole. There  was  good  reason  for  the  uniqueness  of 
subject-matter  in  the  school  of  the  Spirit.  What 
was  it? 

The  answer  is  embodied  in  one  of  the  profound  dis- 
coveries of  modern  pedagogy,  viz.,  that  knowledge  is 
organic.  When  Jacotot  was  installed  as  Professor  of 
French  Literature  in  the  Louvain  University,  whose 
recent  fortunes  have  been  unspeakably  sad,  he  was  sur- 
prised to  find  that  a  large  percentage  of  his  students 
could  not  speak  French.  The  language  of  Holland, 
their  mother-tongue,  was  alien  to  him.  How  should  he 
communicate  with  them?  He  laid  before  his  class 
Fenelon's  "  Telemachus,"  printed  in  both  languages. 
He  required  them  to  memorize  the  French  sentences 
and  puzzle  out  their  meaning  by  comparison  with  the 
Dutch.  In  a  very  short  time  he  brought  them  to  a 
working  acquaintance  with  French  grammar  and  dic- 
tionary. They  became  masters  of  a  new  tongue  by 
the  study  of  a  single  book.  He  could  not  escape  the 
conclusion  that  "  all  is  in  all,"  and  needs  only  well 
directed  effort  to  be  pried  out.  The  principle  is  mo- 
mentous. It  is  the  very  principle  which  Leibnitz  as- 
cribed to  his  Monads;  they  opened  windows  upon  the 
world.  The  grain  of  sand,  too  small  to  be  examined 
with  the  naked  eye,  conceals  the  structure  of  the  uni- 
verse in  its  tiny  form.  Thus  the  person  of  Jesus 
becomes  the  focus  of  explanation  for  the  facts  of  the 
world.  Paul  does  not  scruple  to  swing  his  cosmogony 
about  this  center.    Peter  cannot  dissociate  his  escha- 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  271 

tology  from  the  glory  of  the  same  Christ.  The  history 
of  nature  with  its  apparent  scars,  its  sores  and  tu- 
mults, its  birth-pangs  and  cruel  evolutions,  can  expect 
a  happy  issue  only  in  the  application  of  His  laws.  The 
heart  of  man,  passing  through  a  myriad  throes  of 
anguish,  misled  by  shadows,  discouraged  by  false 
customs,  betrayed  by  sham  reformers,  prostrate  before 
unsubstantial  gods — the  heart  of  man  can  find  its 
renewal  at  the  feet  of  Christ,  and  nowhere  else.  The 
fate  of  man  and  nature  lies  in  the  hands  of  a  Person, 
who  exposes  in  a  form  hitherto  unsuspected  the  very 
deity  of  God.  Because  Jesus  is  divine,  His  centrality 
in  the  Christian  scheme,  far  from  being  an  extrava- 
gant assumption,  is  seen  to  be  the  base  upon  which 
the  unity  of  the  world  rests.  Therefore,  the  creed  of 
the  church  begins  and  ends  with  Him,  just  as  Thales 
found  in  water  the  governing  principle  of  material 
substance,  just  as  Spinoza  conceived  of  God  as  some- 
how coterminous  with  nature. 

The  demand  of  this  verse  carries  with  it  a  stinging 
rebuke  to  the  habits  of  theologians  and  a  sharp  crit- 
icism of  the  traditional  manner  of  teaching  dogmatics. 
For  the  appeal  of  rational  evidence  as  to  the  existence 
of  God  with  which  most  handbooks  open  is  a  gross 
prejudgment  of  the  case;  and  the  distinction  between 
natural  and  revealed  theology  is  a  sheer  begging  of  the 
question.  Christ  is  written  upon  the  forces  of  earth, 
air,  and  sky  as  indelibly  as  upon  the  page  of  Scripture. 
Only  let  the  principles  of  revelation  instruct  us  how  to 
interpret  the  laws  of  nature,  and  instantly  their  hid- 
den and  mysterious  courses  are  brilliant  with  truth. 
Jesus  is  master  equally  of  the  electric  flash  and  of 
the  mind's  swift  impulse.  "  All  is  in  all,"  as  Jacotot 
rightly  says. 


272  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Next  the  lesson  of  the  Spirit  is  specialized ;  he  deals 
with  the  words  of  the  Lord.  There  are  just  two  ways 
of  understanding  a  man's  life,  by  the  words  he  utters 
and  by  the  acts  he  performs.  For  the  average  bi- 
ographer both  sources  present  serious,  sometimes  insu- 
perable difficulties.  Language  may  be  used  to  conceal 
thought ;  but  granted  its  genuineness  we  face  a  problem 
both  objective  and  subjective; — objective  because  we 
are  not  always  sure  whether  we  have  an  exact  report  of 
his  utterances  and  therefore  a  just  statement  of  his 
intent ;  subjective,  because  the  agent  himself  may  have 
been  uncertain  as  to  what  he  thought  upon  a  given 
theme.  But  the  difficulties  in  the  field  of  action  are 
graver.  For  when  you  have  determined  the  exact  facts 
of  the  case,  the  interpretation  rests  ultimately  with 
the  biographer,  who,  do  what  he  will,  cannot  wholly 
exclude  the  personal  equation  from  his  account.  Hence 
the  line  of  conduct,  to  one  observer  strictly  honorable, 
appears  to  another  mind  all  but  reprobate  in  principle. 
Did  Judas  betray  his  Master  for  the  purpose  of  secur- 
ing an  immediate  declaration  of  his  kingship,  or  was 
he  ruled  by  the  sordid  lust  of  gain?  In  the  critical 
event  of  Jesus'  life  was  the  Cross  the  instrument  of 
fiendish  malice  or  was  it  the  sovereign  expression  of 
love?  If  the  Cross  be  honored  as  the  symbol  of  atone- 
ments, how  shall  we  define  its  terms?  Is  atonement 
won  by  force  of  example,  by  the  vindication  of  univer- 
sal law,  by  sacrificial  substitution — how  are  we  to 
analyze  out  its  elements? 

The  problem  of  interpreting  Christ's  public  career 
is  extremely  involved.  Yet  so  is  the  explanation  of 
His  discourses.  No  man  can  attentively  study  the  ser- 
mon on  the  bread — whose  lesson  was  that  spiritual 
life  for  mankind  sprang  exclusively  from  the  eating 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  273 

of  His  flesh  and  the  drinking  of  His  blood — without  ex- 
claiming as  the  disciples  did,  "  This  is  a  hard  saying ; 
who  can  hear  it  ?  "  Who  indeed  can  hear  and  compre- 
hend it?  For  out  of  its  cryptic  epigrams  the  church 
has  woven  three  or  four  separate  and  conflicting  dog- 
mas, and  over  their  demonstration  one  bloody  war, 
called  by  the  Sacramental  name,  has  been  fought. 
Nevertheless,  the  calm  assertion,  "  I  am  the  bread  of 
life,"  if  left  to  itself  and  disentangled  from  the  con- 
troversy over  Jesus'  act  in  instituting  the  Supper, 
would  have  remained  a  full  and  final  definition  of 
spiritual  satisfaction.  The  Holy  Spirit  is  charged 
with  the  duty  of  rehearsing  Christ's  words,  because 
they  more  infallibly  than  acts  predicate  His  essential 
character. 

There  is  another  reason  not  unfamiliar  to  the  cus- 
toms of  men.  We  need  a  standard  of  judgment,  a  foot- 
rule  by  which  we  can  measure  all  subsequent  revela- 
tion. It  is  plain  that  Jesus  measured  ancient  doctrine 
by  His  own  and  boldly  challenged  its  imperfect  max- 
ims. Against  the  prudential  force  of  the  Mosaic  law 
He  places  His  own  complete  inspiration.  In  the  light 
of  history  we  expect  no  less  from  the  teaching  that 
follows  His  day.  If  Paul's  arguments  do  not  square 
with  the  words  of  Jesus,  then  we  are  at  liberty  to 
expunge  them  from  the  sacred  records.  They  are  out 
of  place  there.  But  exact  exegesis  and  sympathetic 
interpretation  prove  that  every  doctrine  of  Paul  lies 
embedded  in  the  heart  of  his  Master.  Take  the  strictly 
Pauline  creed  of  justification  by  faith.  Jesus  seems  to 
lean  towards  works  as  the  conclusive  proof  of  religious 
health :  "  Not  everyone  that  saith  .  .  .  but  he  that 
doeth."  The  antinomy,  however,  is  only  in  form. 
Paul  is  fighting  with  all  his  soul's  fire  against  the 


274  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

complacency  of  the  Pharisee.  Faith  that  burns  bright 
with  the  artificial  stimulus  of  ceremony  and  evaporates 
at  the  pinch  of  hard  service,  such  faith  is  the  subject 
of  contempt  both  to  the  apostle  and  his  Lord.  Endur- 
ing faith  is  anchored  not  in  the  shallows  of  personal 
merit  but  in  the  deep  waters  of  divine  grace.  Again, 
if  prophetic  utterances  are  frail  supports  to  truth  ex- 
cept as  they  are  flbered  by  the  word  of  Christ,  what 
shall  we  say  of  spiritual  edicts  promulgated  since  the 
canon  of  Scripture  was  closed?  A  modern  instance 
challenges  attention.  Can  infallibility  pass  from  the  in- 
visible Lord  to  the  person  of  His  self-appointed  Vicar? 
The  warrant  is  clothed  in  prescriptive  authority: 
"Thou  art  Peter,  and  upon  this  rock  will  I  build  my 
church  " ;  "  Whatsoever  thou  shalt  bind  on  earth  shall 
be  bound  in  heaven."  Peter,  the  craven-hearted,  is 
ofiScially  installed  as  the  vicegerent  of  Christ  on  earth. 
The  papal  throne  being  his  hereditary  seat,  whatever 
issues  from  its  curial  judgment  is  imperishable  truth. 
Three  facts  negative  this  claim — bad  exegesis,  a  glaring 
historical  hiatus,  and  the  moral  character  of  the  Papacy 
for  many  centuries.  The  first  one  by  itself  is  decisive. 
The  church  has  no  right  to  formulate  any  dogma  save 
that  which  is  bound  up  with  the  spirit  of  the  Lord's 
revelation ;  and  there  is  not  the  most  meticulous  point 
of  evidence  to  prove  that  He  ever  entrusted  the  final 
destiny  of  souls  to  other  hands  than  His  own. 

The  third  fact  in  the  teaching  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is 
that  the  words  of  Jesus  must  become  an  integral  part 
of  the  life  of  the  church.  I  find  this  fact  stated  in  the 
words  of  the  verse,  "  He  shall  bring  all  things  to  your 
remembrance."  Memory  is  one  of  the  sure  tests  of 
individuality.  If  a  man  be  unable  to  identify  his 
present  experience  with  the  place  and  persons  pre- 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  275 

viously  observed,  how  shall  he  ever  merge  his  con- 
scious acts  into  the  supreme  thought  of  a  Self?  Memory 
is  the  self  working  earlier  experiences  into  new  rela- 
tions. The  choice  of  this  term  is  not  accidental  in 
the  language  of  the  Lord,  He  aflSrms  that  His  truth 
is  already  latent  in  the  mind  of  the  church,  and  that 
the  church  will  understand  its  meaning  at  specific 
periods  in  her  history.  The  first  occasion  for  its  ap- 
preciation was  found  in  the  making  of  the  Christian 
Canon.  Some  men  have  pictured  the  words  of  revela- 
tion as  dropped  by  magic  into  select  minds  to  be  com- 
mitted faithfully  by  them  to  enduring  parchment.  The 
fallacy  of  this  explanation  is  exposed  by  contact  with 
scientific  psychology.  For  supposing  that  Deity  might 
work  in  that  way,  yet  no  mind  can  take  in  any  fact  or 
law  which  it  is  unable  to  establish  in  organic  relation 
to  experiences  already  registered.  The  primitive  church 
passed  under  the  spell  of  Jesus'  preaching,  and  in  the 
course  of  time  her  testimony  based  upon  this  hardened 
into  a  deposit  of  faith,  which  under  the  hands  of  Mat- 
thew and  his  fellow-craftsmen  became  the  official  pro- 
nouncement of  the  Spirit.  The  temperament,  the  bent 
of  sympathy,  the  individual  angle  of  vision  are  mani- 
fest in  each  author's  work,  and  ratify  the  conviction 
that  the  Bible  came  into  being  not  because  unsuspect- 
ing minds  were  charged  with  a  miraculous  current  of 
inspiration,  but  because  devoted  spirits  converted 
their  private  experience  into  the  fructifying  terms  of 
common  speech.  "  The  words  that  I  speak  unto  you," 
says  Jesus,  "  they  are  spirit  and  they  are  life." 

We  have  no  doubt  that  in  grappling  with  the  prob- 
lems of  metaphysics  and  social  practice  primitive  be- 
lievers proved  themselves  apt  pupils  of  the  invisible 
Teacher.    They  brought  to  fine  efflorescence  the  germ- 


276  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

inal  truths  that  had  been  planted  by  their  Master. 
■Has  that  aptitude  been  preserved  by  the  church?  The 
query  is  of  perennial  interest.  We  are  sure  that  the 
final  meaning  of  Jesus'  revelation  could  not  come  to 
the  bar  of  Scriptural  expression  for  the  simple  reason, 
that  the  situation  in  church  and  state  during  the  first 
century  did  not  call  for  the  settlement  of  issues,  which 
only  later  crises  developed.  Thus,  we  know  how  the 
bitter  struggle  for  social  equality  broke  upon  the  in- 
fant community  in  Jerusalem,  and  how  James,  the 
acknowledged  leader  of  the  group,  checked  its  menace 
by  reference  to  the  words  and  habits  of  Christ.  The 
foundation  for  all  Christian  economics  was  laid  there. 
But  the  practical  mind  of  James  could  not  anticipate 
the  formidable  problems  which  were  to  face  the  church 
at  the  opening  of  the  twentieth  century.  Capital  and 
Labor  once  acting  side  by  side  in  the  apprentice  shop 
or  the  ripening  field  now  stand  as  two  armed  camps, 
each  waiting  for  the  advantageous  moment  to  strike. 
A  broader  interpretation  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
awaits  the  thought  of  the  church.  The  principle  of 
action  will  not  be  new;  for  every  possible  thrust  of 
human  impulse  was  anticipated  by  the  unerring 
Preacher.  He  knew  that  the  world  we  live  in — phys- 
ically and  morally — is  fluid,  and  that  the  truths  we 
are  able  to  extract  from  its  forms  are  fluid,  too.  Hence 
he  foreshadows  the  justice  and  human  sympathy  which 
must  surely  rule  in  the  ultimate  settlement  of  social 
problems.  Just  how  his  solemn  principles  can  enter 
obtuse  minds  and  be  fertilized  there,  only  time  and  the 
genius  of  Christian  statesmanship  will  determine.  The 
school  of  divine  instruction  is  unquestionably  hard, 
but  its  lessons  are  the  inevitable  guides  to  faith  and 
practice. 


THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  SPIRIT  277 

Even  more  momentous  is  the  "  remembrance "  of 
Jesus'  words  in  the  sphere  of  natural  science.  At  its 
gates  modern  Biblical  criticism  has  stood  silent,  main- 
taining that  the  Book  is  the  vademecum  of  the  closet, 
not  of  the  physical  laboratory.  Doubtless  it  recol- 
lects the  imposing  buffoonery  and  the  wicked  cruelty 
which  attended  the  church's  attempt  to  dictate  scien- 
tific theory.  The  blood  of  Bruno  cries  from  the  ground. 
Nevertheless,  the  teachings  of  the  four  Gospels  are 
full  of  the  most  penetrating  insight  into  the  laws  of 
nature.  Evolution  has  been  hailed  as  a  doctrine  un- 
heralded in  the  meditations  of  the  classic  authors,  and 
contrary  to  the  traditions  of  Moses.  Aristotle,  to  be 
sure,  knows  something  about  the  law  of  genesis  and 
decay,  but  his  law  finds  application  in  the  static  uni- 
verse. The  idea  of  progress  is  unknown.  Shall  we  say 
the  same  of  Jesus?  Let  me  warn  you  not  to  try  to 
decipher  the  exact  terms  of  science  from  His  language. 
He  speaks  in  parables  here  as  in  His  religious  aphor- 
isms. Yet  in  the  fifth  chapter  of  John  we  find  this 
gem  of  thought  inlaid,  "  My  father  worketh  up  to  the 
present,  and  I  work."  It  is  a  compendious  exposition 
of  His  own  act  in  healing  the  lame  man  on  the  Sab- 
bath. The  projected  end  of  all  work  is  rest  in  con- 
templation of  its  successful  issue.  The  particular  work 
involved  is  the  making  of  a  whole  out  of  torn  and 
scattered  units.  To  secure  this  a  continuous  cor- 
relation of  forces  is  necessary.  God  works,  and  works 
towards  a  unifying  end. 

The  modern  name  for  such  effort  is  development. 
What  Jesus  did  in  the  symbolic  cure  divine  power  had 
been  doing  throughout  the  reaches  of  eternity.  The 
six  dramatic  scenes  of  Genesis  are  cross-sections  taken 
from  a  growing  world,  not  instantaneous  blocks  of 


278  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

creative  exertion.  On  the  mystic  heights  of  Hebrew 
fancy,  one  man  here,  another  man  there — as  in  the 
eighth  chapter  of  Proverbs — caught  at  the  same 
appalling  fact.  But  Jesus  with  consummate  skill 
gave  the  fact  its  intelligible  form — "  My  father  work- 
eth  up  to  this  moment."  I  do  not  say  that  Darwin 
was  conscious  of  unfolding  a  text  of  Scripture  when 
he  wrote  the  "  Origin  of  Species  "  ;  he  was  not  a  hom- 
ilete,  and  had  no  more  interest  in  Biblical  study  than 
the  average  scientist  of  his  day.  But  literal  repetition 
counts  for  nothing.  The  historic  point  is  that  the 
greatest  discovery  since  Newton  was  made  by  a  mind 
distinctly  under  the  influence  of  Christian  ideas,  and 
that  the  founder  of  the  Darwinian  hypothesis  became 
the  unwitting  interpreter  of  an  inspired  doctrine, 
which  had  lain  unelucidated  throughout  the  entire 
course  of  Christian  thought. 

What  next,  we  find  ourselves  asking,  will  the  divine 
Preceptor  select  from  Jesus'  words  to  bring  to  the 
notice  of  His  waiting  church? 


XVII 
PAX  GHRISTI 

John  1^:27.  "Peace,  I  leave  with  you, 
my  peace  I  give  unto  you;  not  as  the  world 
giveth,  give  I  unto  you." 

NOT  a  very  substantial  contribution  to  the  purse 
of  an  impoverished  faith !  If  Jesus  could  have 
substituted  power  for  peace  and  reenforced  it 
by  appeal  to  imperial  arms,  His  words  would  have 
awakened  instant  confidence  in  the  most  timorous 
mind.  If  He  had  shown  how  His  peace  was  an  historic 
episode  in  the  Pax  Romana  which  Augustus  pro- 
claimed for  the  world,  His  prescience  might  have 
gained  for  Him  a  political  prestige  all  out  of  pro- 
portion to  His  humble  position  in  church  and  state. 
Again,  had  He  been  inclined  to  reason,  as  men  of  our 
time  have  done  without  being  suspected  of  framing  a 
Christian  apologetic,  that  religion  lies  at  the  base  of 
all  civil  and  moral  conduct,  as  well  for  the  savage  as 
for  the  aesthete,  and  that  true  religious  growth  can  be 
obtained  solely  in  the  atmosphere  of  peace  and  con- 
cord, He  would  have  arrayed  Himself  with  the  authori- 
tative leaders  of  His  own  nation,  and  by  the  same 
stroke  sped  a  shaft  of  gracious  light  into  the  chaotic 
philosophies  beyond  its  pale.  To  assume  either  of 
these  roles  would  have  been  to  enact  the  part  of  a 
master  of  affairs.  But  to  utter  the  valedictory  phrase 
familiar  to  His  race,  load  it  with  personal  implica- 
tions, and  distinguish  it  sharply  in  effectiveness  from 

279 


280  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

the  common  usage  of  the  street,  is  a  sheer  waste  of 
effort  as  well  as  proof  of  the  Speaker's  mistaken  esti- 
mate of  Himself.  The  magic  of  a  word  is  thwarted  by 
the  simple  rehearsal  of  facts. 

So  much  for  the  opinion  of  our  shrewd  and  practical 
critic — some  Philip  who  acknowledges  no  principle 
save  that  which  can  be  demonstrated  at  once  by  a  test 
ease,  a  Loyola  who  harnessed  the  emotions  and  wills  of 
men  to  a  set  of  ironclad  rules,  an  untutored  son  of 
Zebedee,  who  would  brain  the  conceited  disbelief  of  the 
world  by  a  bolt  of  retribution — men  of  impatient 
temper,  of  white-heat  action,  to  whom  the  searching 
of  heart  and  the  conning  of  ideas  is  offensive  because 
futile,  who  see  everything  in  the  present  and  nothing 
in  the  uncharted  future.  To  such  men  the  farewell  gift 
of  Jesus  was  a  taunt  if  not  a  gross  insult.  By  the 
legerdemain  of  language  it  conjured  up  a  state  of 
mind  which  it  had  not  the  faintest  hope  of  making 
real.  Peace  does  not  come  by  the  execution  of  a  re- 
pudiated reformer.  Peace  tarries,  dumb  and  unsee- 
ing, for  the  converted  Israelite  who  a  generation  later 
finds  in  the  crumbling  walls  of  the  Holy  City  a  sign 
of  impending  changes  throughout  the  world.  In  face 
of  criticism  heard  on  every  corner  we  ought  to  ask 
what  Jesus  meant  by  His  cryptic  sentence.  If  His 
benison  was  a  promise  of  peace  what  is  its  nature,  and 
how  may  it  be  conferred? 


The  problem  is  not  set  for  the  first  time  in  human 
thinking.  On  the  surface  of  Greek  inquiry  the  via 
media  had  been  traced  with  the  nicety  of  Aristotelian 
argument.    The  Stoics  in  later  centuries  had  mastered 


PAX  CHRISTI  281 

every  resource  for  the  settlement  of  similar  questions. 
Far  away  among  the  brown  men  of  India  five  hundred 
years  before  Jesus  preached,  an  exact  parallel  was 
fixed  between  mental  rest  and  the  rippleless  placidity 
of  body.  Peace  as  a  problem  is  born  with  life,  because 
interests  here  are  not  fixed  but  fluid.  It  will  throw  a 
flood  of  light  upon  the  diflSculties  of  the  problem  if  we 
find  out  how  men  have  actually  defined  this  peace.  I 
shall  not  attempt  an  exhaustive  summary;  but  you 
will  easily  see  that  Paracelsus  searching  for  a  form- 
ula of  gold  is  Lilliputian  in  stature  compared  with  the 
genius  who  can  fuse  the  rebellious  elements  of  the 
moral  world  into  an  harmonious  character. 

The  initial  step  has  been  to  define  peace  in  terms  of 
things.  That  is  due  to  the  lingering  childhood  of  our 
experience.  Certain  thinkers  argue  for  the  sover- 
eignty of  the  physical  senses.  Others  hope  to  reach 
a  point  where  reflection  can  be  conducted  behind 
closed  doors,  in  the  executive  chamber  of  the  mind. 
It  is  not  necessary  for  me  to  adjust  the  differences. 
Some  who  belong  to  the  former  group — the  cruder 
sort — solve  our  problem  at  once  by  holding  that  peace 
is  equivalent  to  ease.  Now  ease  implies  reaction  upon 
environment.  It  can  only  be  understood  when  shad- 
owed by  the  presence  of  material  goods.  If,  how- 
ever, I  have  no  property  and  decline  to  enter  the 
shambles  for  it,  I  do  not  by  that  act  convey  myself 
beyond  the  field  of  stimulus.  The  Cynics  imagined 
they  did  so  by  their  brazen  contempt  for  social  values 
and  their  elaborate  praise  of  virtue.  But  the  poor 
man  who  spurns  prosperity  executes  just  as  keen  a 
response  to  wealth  as  the  rich  man.  The  peace  realized 
by  Antisthenes  was  only  an  easing  off  of  the  heavy 
burdens  that  his  wealthy  neighbor  cheerfully  assumed. 


282  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

He  negated  the  appeal  of  luxury  and  physical  comfort, 
not  understanding  what  a  significant  share  they  had 
in  the  development  of  the  spiritual  life.  Is  absence 
of  responsibility  as  to  goods  the  same  as  peace? 

If  not,  we  must  examine  the  claims  of  the  opposing 
theory.  Can  I  find  a  perfect  balance  of  mind  within 
the  confines  of  a  sheltered  palace?  Burnished  brass, 
pictured  tapestry,  the  gleam  of  gilded  lights,  the  scent 
of  musk  and  roses,  are  not  incompatible  with  serene 
reflection.  Aurelius  was  garbed  in  purple  and  sur- 
rounded by  every  evidence  of  worldly  pomp,  but  he 
was  not  a  slave  to  imperious  sense.  His  unflagging 
purpose  made  him  the  master  of  circumstance.  Peace 
and  ease  may  constitute  a  true  equation.  Neverthe- 
less, the  coefScient  of  the  terms  should  be  carefully 
noted.  If  not  expressed  it  is  understood.  X  equals  Y, 
because  Y  has  a  coefficient  which  the  mathematician 
has  allowed  to  remain  unstated.  If  peace  and  ease 
be  identical  the  second  term  of  the  equation  gets  a 
meaning,  only  when  you  have  thrown  the  mental 
temper  of  your  subject  into  the  situation  which  con- 
fronts him.  Thus,  Nero  occupied  precisely  the  same 
place  in  the  Roman  government  as  his  philosophical 
successor.  His  life,  however,  took  on  an  utterly  dif- 
ferent cast.  Turmoil,  hate,  suspicion  leading  to  the 
crime  of  matricide,  involved  and  pestered  him.  Dis- 
temper that  struck  off  discordant  notes  from  an  un- 
willing instrument  while  the  city  reddened  with  his 
caprice,  grim  cruelty  that  sneered  in  the  faces  of  his 
suffering  victims,  made  his  imperial  affluence  a  mock- 
ery. The  coefficient  may  be  suppressed,  but  its  impor- 
tance to  the  equation  is  admitted  by  all.  If  any  man 
still  insists  that  ease  makes  peace,  let  him  consult  the 
ease  of  the  man  of  wealth.     Nothing,  unless  it  be 


PAX  CHRISTI  283 

political  power,  will  so  surely  heap  upon  a  citizen  the 
bitter  recriminations  of  his  neighbor.  He  may  hold 
his  head  high  and  profess  himself  impervious  to  their 
insinuating  words;  but  human  nature  never  gets  be- 
yond the  dread  of  personal  injury.  Private  property, 
whether  he  knows  it  or  not,  puts  a  man  in  the  attitude 
of  defense,  and  what  is  that  but  the  first  act  of  war? 
Ease,  in  other  words,  is  not  the  handmaiden  of  peace, 
but  a  kind  of  armed  neutrality,  whose  superficial  calm 
may  be  broken  up  by  the  slightest  hint  of  opposition. 

The  problem  before  us  resists  solution  when  inter- 
preted in  terms  of  things.  Suppose  we  change  its  form 
and  seek  an  issue  in  personal  relations.  Submission, 
not  ease,  is  the  price  of  peace.  Such  a  situation  con- 
fronted the  French  people  in  1870.  The  presumption 
and  boastfulness  of  their  ruler  invited  a  clash  with  the 
powerful  oligarchy  of  Prussia.  Teutonic  blood  ran 
riot  with  the  heat  of  revenge  for  the  outrages  of  the 
first  Napoleon.  Without  due  military  preparation, 
without  cordial  support  from  a  people  whose  interests 
had  long  been  the  sport  of  changing  governments, 
without  competent  leadership  in  the  field,  imperial  ca- 
price carried  its  armies  to  the  ignoble  defeats  of  Sedan 
and  Gravelotte.  Peace  came  by  passing  under  the 
yoke.  Rich  and  prosperous  provinces  were  wrenched 
from  organic  union  with  the  State.  Citizens  with 
French  feeling  and  unswerving  loyalty  to  French  ideals 
became  subject  to  an  arrogant  conqueror.  Cathedrals 
that  once  resounded  with  the  vibrant  notes  of  Gallic 
worship  caught  up  languorously  and  as  with  reluctant 
voice  the  harsher  tones  of  an  alien  speech.  Peace  was 
restored.  Was  it  peace  in  a  universal  sense?  The 
embers  of  an  ancient  cry  kindled  into  new  flame  at  the 
magic  touch  of  disaster.    Out  of  the  ashes  of  national 


284  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

humiliation  a  modern  France  arose,  seeking  by  rigor- 
ous training  of  mind  a  settlement  of  social  diflSculties, 
crying  for  relief  from  the  tyranny  of  ecclesiastical 
dogmatism,  developing  a  superb  self-restraint  that  in 
even  more  trying  circumstances  would  rouse  its  zeal 
to  a  defense  of  her  municipal  destiny. 

Nor  was  this  all.  Submission  could  not  quench  the 
love  for  her  sequestered  soil.  France  could  not  and 
would  not  yield  her  age-long  title  to  fields  and  cities 
which  the  fortunes  of  war  had  swept  from  her  grasp. 
On  the  spacious  square  in  Paris  for  forty  years  the 
statue  of  Strasbourg  has  lain  draped  in  the  sable 
folds  of  bereavement.  While  the  towers  of  that  city 
are  lit  by  the  glare  of  unsympathetic  fires,  French  pa- 
triotism will  never  sink  into  acquiescence.  Some  day, 
they  say,  the  tricolor  ensign  and  the  fleur-de-lis  will 
flash  from  the  Cathedral's  solitary  spire.  Some  day 
the  ingenious  clock  in  its  nave  will  inaugurate  its 
solemn  procession  of  apostles  and  saints  at  the  hour 
of  twelve,  in  the  presence  of  faces  radiant  with  ac- 
complished hope.  Submission,  reserved  though  it  be, 
is  not  peace  either  for  a  nation  or  for  a  man.  What- 
ever force  of  human  contriving  you  or  your  neighbor 
may  bow  to  for  a  time,  if  you  are  deeply  conscious 
that  such  a  force  is  wrongly  imposed,  neither  you  nor 
he  can  obtain  perfect  peace,  until  you  have  cut  its 
unholy  fetters  in  twain  and  stood  upon  your  feet,  men 
of  inflexible  purpose,  tried  in  the  furnace  of  affliction 
and  not  found  wanting. 

I  approach  a  more  subtle  definition  of  peace.  It 
may  be  applied  under  the  rubric  of  social  experience, 
or  in  the  quiet  haunts  of  private  devotion.  The 
severe  morality  of  Puritanism  was  a  brave  attempt  to 
realize  its  terms  on  the  platform  of  national  character. 


PAX  CHRISTI  285 

In  a  more  bewildering  way  the  Brahmin  mind  sought 
to  throw  the  cloak  of  philosophy  over  its  theory  of 
peace.  To  be  absorbed  in  the  Infinite  is  the  primary 
wish  of  the  soul.  Peace  in  these  historic  instances  is 
self-repression.  The  spirit  of  other  worldliness  per- 
vades for  a  moment  the  fabric  of  society,  but  only  for 
a  moment;  ultimately  it  will  clash  with  the  common 
ideas  of  statehood.  Such  imposing  shibboleths  as 
national  destiny,  economic  pressure,  military  prepar- 
edness, prove  how  strangely  out  of  place  the  ghost  of 
self-effacement  would  find  itself  in  the  world  of  moil 
and  toil  today.  This  unresting  ambition,  this  endeavor 
after  superiority,  this  suspicion  of  motives  and  mis- 
trust of  deed  argue  not  for  restrained  impulse  but  for 
an  assertion  of  personal  might. 

Now  at  base  the  satisfaction  of  desire  is  a  correct 
religious  program.  If  the  complexity  of  modern  rela- 
tions has  done  nothing  else,  it  has  shaken  religion 
out  of  her  isolated  complacency,  and  made  her  offices 
a  part  of  the  necessary  activities  of  human  life.  Re- 
ligion is  the  divine  instrument  for  the  complete 
development  of  personality.  Thomas  k  Kempis  is  not 
an  authoritative  guide  for  the  seeker  after  truth.  "  If 
thou  attain  to  the  full  contempt  of  thyself,"  he  says, 
"  know  that  thou  shalt  then  enjoy  abundance  of  peace, 
as  great  as  this  state  of  pilgrimage  can  afford."  But 
why  should  I  hold  in  disesteem  the  agility  of  limb, 
the  quick  perception  of  eye,  the  readiness  of  mind  to 
grapple  with  the  unexplored  reserves  of  science?  By 
a  strict  sequence  of  logic  I  should  be  forced  to  deny 
my  right  to  entertain  affection  for  Deity  or  repose 
faith  in  His  simplest  commands.  Self-repression  would 
end  in  spiritual  defeat.  If,  however,  we  are  to  secure 
independence  for  the  mind,  must  we  not  reduce  its 


286  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

contact  with  external  interests  to  a  minimum?  "How 
can  he  long  abide  in  peace,"  exclaims  the  cloistered 
writer,  "  who  trusts  himself  to  the  cares  of  others, 
who  seeks  occasion  abroad,  who  little  or  seldom  recol- 
lects himself  within  his  own  breast?"  Thomas  was 
not  a  psychologist;  with  his  limited  study  of  the 
tangled  system  of  impulses  under  which  we  live  and 
move  and  have  our  being,  he  did  not  understand  that 
men  cannot  thrive  on  the  bread  of  private  meditation ; 
they  demand  the  quick  neural  sympathies  of  the  out- 
side world.  They  have  eyes,  and  their  vision  will 
mirror  the  gorgeous  beauty  of  leaf  and  landscape. 
They  have  ears,  and  without  effort  they  convert  the 
sounds  of  forest  and  valley — the  hum  of  insect  and  the 
neigh  of  distant  horses — into  the  melodic  tones  of 
ballad  or  nocturne.  They  have  an  irresistible  aptitude 
for  love,  and  out  of  an  unbarred  soul  rushes  forth 
a  tumultuous  flood  of  passion  upon  one  of  its  kind. 
It  is  a  mistake,  I  say,  to  define  man's  peace  as  forget- 
fulness  of  the  embrace  of  others.  The  peace  of  a 
mother  is  her  stern  abandon  of  self  for  her  child.  The 
peace  of  a  statesman  is  not  a  calculated  compromise 
whereby  both  factions  in  the  nation  glimpse  a  shallow 
prosperity.  Repression  of  native  instinct,  the  obliter- 
ation of  aesthetic  values,  is  a  vain  road  to  peace.  No, 
Simon  Stylites,  you  have  failed  to  win  a  spiritual  con- 
quest by  your  silent  posture  on  the  column.  The 
nerve  of  action  is  stilled,  the  common  habits  of  men 
are  declined.  You  have  changed  your  body  into  a 
monument,  but  the  secret  will  which  dominates  lust 
and  faith  you  have  not  conquered.  Peace  stands  a 
trembling  stranger  at  your  side.  No,  Jacob  Boehme, 
winsome  as  your  mystic  reveries  seem,  crave  though 
we  may  for  unmoored  absorption  in  the  divine  love. 


PAX  CHRISTI  287 

still  neither  you  nor  we,  your  generation  nor  ours, 
may  seek  release  from  the  neighbor  duties,  which  pain 
and  hate  and  the  thousand  vices  of  society  have  but 
served  to  make  more  urgent.  Peace  is  not  there;  for 
no  conflict  is  quite  so  keen  as  that  which  rages  in  the 
breast  of  a  man  whose  hand  has  deliberately  closed 
the  gate  of  help  to  a  brother  in  need. 


II 

What  is  the  peace  of  Christ?  It  cannot  be  defined 
by  ease  or  submission  or  repression,  for  each  of  these 
is  absent  from  His  life.  He  never  surrounded  Himself 
with  the  awards  of  social  success.  On  the  other  hand. 
He  could  truthfully  say  that  the  Son  of  man  had 
nowhere  to  lay  His  head.  He  defied  the  exactions  of 
caste  in  church  and  state.  He  could  yield  His  body  to 
be  slain,  but  He  would  never  permit  His  soul  to  be 
stained  by  the  most  trivial  concession  to  error.  Finally, 
He  stood  forth  in  the  pride  of  manhood,  in  the  con- 
sciousness of  an  unquestioned  Sonship ;  He  did  not  need 
the  asceticism  of  a  Baptist  to  expound  the  full  glory 
of  His  character.  If  Jesus  possessed  a  peace  which 
overleaped  any  definitions  of  His  day,  what,  we  ask 
again,  were  its  terms? 

First  I  think  we  must  describe  it  as  perfect  balance. 
The  balance  I  have  in  mind  is  not  the  immovability 
of  the  steel-yards.  You  have  seen  the  Greek  image 
of  Justice — scales  evenly  poised,  not  a  grain  too  much 
in  either  pan,  not  a  movement  up  or  down  of  either 
arm.  Peace,  another  name  for  justice,  finds  its  com- 
petent symbol  here.  But  the  poise  of  spirit  which 
Jesus  had  was  not  static;  it  was  the  secretion  of  a 
nerve-driven  organism.    I  can  picture  it  as  the  pose 


288  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

of  the  eagle,  soaring  above  the  crash  of  tempest, 
holding  itself  still  with  its  eye  to  the  sun,  every  muscle 
taut,  every  member  strained — in  perfect  command  of 
its  salient  powers.  I  can  liken  peace  to  the  restraint 
of  a  battle-charger,  restive  in  face  of  smoking  cannon, 
eyes  alert  and  nostrils  distended,  waiting  the  word  of 
command  for  the  final  plunge.  Into  the  concentrated 
composure  of  the  moment  enter  the  training  of  gener- 
ations and  the  past  experiences  of  triumph. 

Peace  is  the  balance  of  private  forces.  It  came  to 
no  more  solemn  issue  in  the  career  of  Jesus  than  when 
He  stood  calm  and  self-possessed  before  the  Tribunal 
of  the  Governor.  Men  sometimes  take  their  peace 
from  the  flinching  gesture  of  their  opponent.  The 
searching  gaze  of  Jesus  read  clearly  the  craven  im- 
pulses which  shaded  in  gray  lines  the  visage  of  His 
judge.  But  His  own  serenity  was  independent.  If  He 
had  been  tried  at  the  bar  of  an  implacable  Draco  His 
bearing  would  have  been  unchanged.  The  purpose  of 
His  mission  in  the  world,  the  triumphant  vindication 
of  His  personal  power,  the  defeat  of  malignant  insinu- 
ations by  priest  and  elder,  the  conviction  that  spiritual 
Issues  are  never  determined  by  physical  instrumental- 
ities, the  apocalyptic  look  into  the  future — a  world 
aglow  with  moral  beauty,  character  transformed, 
states  recreated,  social  habits  fibered  by  a  new  sense 
of  justice,  literature  no  longer  debased  by  immoral  con- 
ceits but  redolent  of  holy  passion,  Beatrice  the  emblem 
of  unsoiled  affection,  Lancelot  the  champion  of  right- 
eous motives — such  facts  and  images  conspired  to 
frame  the  peace  of  Jesus,  as  He  stood  undaunted  be- 
fore Rome's  scepter.  For  why  should  the  rage  of  Jew- 
ish accusers  disturb  His  mind?    How  could  the  vulgar 


PAX  CHRISTI  289 

expressions  of  contempt  by  coarse  and  blood-stained 
soldiers  swerve  Him  from  the  goal?  Would  He  break 
the  granite  firmness  of  His  decision  by  a  momentary 
display  of  temper  under  the  scorpion  lash  of  Pilate's 
scorn?  The  king  does  not  change  countenance  when 
his  courtiers  threaten  or  his  guards  rebel.  Jesus'  peace 
was  not  sensitive  to  the  temperatures  of  opinion.  He 
knew  what  was  in  man,  and  He  knew  what  was  in  Him- 
self. Sure  of  His  own  purpose  He  let  His  judges  work 
out  their  inevitable  end. 

The  peace  of  Jesus  again  was  the  peace  of  action. 
It  is  a  gross  misjudgment  of  His  language  to  make  Him 
the  original  advocate  of  passive  resistance.  You  do  not 
read  His  words  in  that  sense,  and  certainly  I  should 
be  a  feeble  interpreter  of  His  career  if  I  classified  His 
reserve  before  the  brutal  jests  of  His  tormentors  as  the 
abject  surrender  of  selfhood.  That  such  reserve  must 
have  a  wide  space  in  our  estimate  of  Jesus  I  am 
willing  to  admit.  But  reserve  in  such  a  case  is  not 
inaction,  it  is  the  highest  form  of  action.  It  asserts 
the  hegemony  of  spiritual  powers  over  the  seductions 
of  sense.  The  savage  chief,  the  cultured  sage,  under 
stress  of  momentary  need  can  strike  back  by  hand  or 
bitter  word.  Even  the  fledgling  in  its  nest  acts  upon 
the  thrill  of  organic  resentment.  Only  a  chastened 
soul  is  able  to  refrain,  because  it  alone  has  learned 
what  the  experience  of  history  has  vainly  striven  to 
teach — that  retaliation  in  kind  is  abortive.  It  is  not 
true  action,  it  is  the  heedless  repeating  of  another's 
act,  a  sort  of  blind  imitation  driving  straight  across 
the  total  meaning  of  life.  That  is  to  say,  the  injured 
party  shall  in  all  reason  do  nothing  else  but  turn  the 
other  cheek;  for  by  so  doing  he  introduces  a  new 
mode  of  action  altogether  beyond  the  calculation  of 


290  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

brute  instinct,  and  pronounces  the  doom  of  martial 
might. 

Peace,  in  other  words,  is  not  the  organ  of  passion. 
Spinoza,  who  as  few  men  of  his  time  felt  the  sting  of 
venomous  aspersion,  construes  the  impressions  of  sense 
as  having  no  logical  coordination.  The  eye,  the  ear, 
the  touch,  carry  their  images  pell-mell  into  the  brain, 
and  that  which  yields  the  greatest  toll  of  fleshly  grati- 
fication gets  our  quickest  response.  But  a  conflict  is 
unavoidable ;  the  stronger  is  pitted  against  the  weaker, 
the  nearer  against  the  remoter,  the  grosser  against  the 
more  refined.  Man  is  in  a  maelstrom  of  war,  so  long 
as  untamed  impulse  rules  his  life.  To  silence  the  de- 
bate, Spinoza  proposes  that  we  undertake  to  find  out 
just  how  the  mind  receives  its  impressions  and  how 
each  kind  is  related  to  the  purpose,  which  as  human 
beings  we  are  bound  to  pursue.  We  must  make  our 
ideas  clear;  we  must  be  agents,  not  re-agents,  men  of 
action  and  not  the  sport  of  every  wind  of  chance.  By 
a  process  so  severe,  impulse  turns  into  reason,  chaos 
into  order,  sanguinary  warfare  into  the  benisons  of 
peace. 

If  you  would  sight  the  contrast  peer  for  a  moment 
into  the  face  of  Simon  Peter  as  he  stands  by  the 
porter's  fire,  and  then  study  the  demeanor  of  his  Master 
before  the  court.  Peter  is  the  vortex  of  contrary  emo- 
tions. In  the  first  place  the  instinct  of  curiosity  had 
thrust  him  into  the  danger-zone.  If  he  had  consulted 
the  claims  of  common  prudence  he  would  have  re- 
mained in  hiding  with  his  affrighted  comrades. 
Secondly,  he  was  astonished  at  being  recognized  as  an 
accomplice  of  the  Prisoner.  But  suspense  at  once 
gave  way  to  fear,  which  had  not  even  the  presence  of 
supporting  friends  for  its  relief.     Fear  brought  forth 


PAX  CHRISTI  291 

vehement  denials — words  of  dishonesty,  words  of 
treachery,  words  of  moral  defeat.  Then  two  things 
happened,  the  cock  crew  and  Jesus  looked  at  Peter. 
A  lifetime  of  emotional  conflict  was  crowded  into  a 
few  seconds.  Men  sometimes  pnd  themselves  under 
the  thrust  of  a  mighty  temptation.  They  have  been 
spiritual  infants  before,  with  no  warrant  for  assum- 
ing the  rights  of  moral  manhood.  Now  they  step  out 
into  the  glorious  sunlight  of  self-consciousness.  They 
are  no  longer  led,  they  lead.  The  change  from  passion 
to  action  we  call  conversion.  Jesus  called  it  by  that 
name,  and  counseled  the  converted  man  to  strengthen 
his  brethren.  I  maintain  that  conversion  is  not  a 
calculated  surrender  of  will  to  a  superior  power.  The 
medieval  saint  has  blundered.  Paradox  though  it  be, 
conflict  is  always  the  spawn  of  surrender.  The  Chris- 
tian never  surrenders — even  to  God.  He  identifies  his 
thought  with  the  beauty  and  assurance  of  heaven,  and 
thereby  attains  his  spiritual  majority.  Unlike  the 
hero  of  antiquity  he  demands  no  meritricious  defense 
but  stands  upon  his  own  feet  and  defies  the  most  in- 
gratiating Sirens  of  sense.  He  is  in  complete  control 
of  his  resources;  he  is  at  peace  with  himself.  Peace 
other  than  this  is  war.  Where  lies,  we  ask,  the 
sovereign  contrast  between  the  disciple  and  his  Lord? 
Just  at  the  point,  and  there  only,  where  judgment  un- 
hands forever  the  self-effacing  grip  of  passion. 

Peace  once  more  is  correlate  with  purpose.  A 
peace  which  settles  like  a  pall  upon  exhausted  war- 
riors can  be  nothing  other  than  the  peace  of  death. 
If  for  Christ  peace  meant  solely  the  hush  of  clamorous 
cries  in  the  dark  silence  of  Calvary,  we  may  read  there 
the  syllables  of  private  purpose  attained,  the  pangs  of 
jealousy  sated,  but  we  cannot  disentangle  the  subtler 


292  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

notes  which  pass  beyond  the  borders  of  physical 
change  and  seize  upon  the  essential  character  of  soul. 
Death  gives  peace,  the  cessation  of  warfare;  it  yields 
no  answer  to  the  fervent  hopes  for  which  men  have 
steeped  their  hands  and  bodies  in  blood.  Blood  is 
the  price,  it  is  not  the  object  we  seek.  Peace  which 
the  shedding  of  blood  at  length  forces  upon  the  world 
is  ephemeral  and  without  content — a  phosphorescent 
glow,  except  as  its  light  is  polarized  by  a  mighty  pur- 
pose.   What  is  the  purpose  of  peace? 

"  Peace  with  honor "  is  the  first  watchword  on  the 
lips  of  aggressive  patriotism.  So  long  as  the  honor  of 
the  nation  is  in  danger  there  can  be  no  peace.  Many 
questions  are  susceptible  of  adjustment  by  the  prin- 
ciple of  give-and-take.  Property  rights,  boundary 
lines,  the  equalization  of  economic  opportunities  are 
justiciable  matters,  which  no  people  in  the  light  of 
international  law  should  decline  to  submit  to  a  proper 
court  of  arbitration.  But  questions  that  affect  the 
sovereignty  of  government,  my  right,  my  country's 
right  to  live,  are  beyond  the  pale  of  adjudication;  they 
belong  to  private  honor  and  shall  be  maintained  at  a 
cost  of  life  and  treasure.  Peace  which  does  not  guar- 
antee my  self's  integrity  is  not  peace  but  contemptible 
surrender. 

Let  us  test  this  creed  by  the  conduct  of  Jesus.  To 
maintain  one's  honor  one  must  resent  by  word  and  act 
every  slur  upon  the  good  name  one  bears,  call  the 
offender  to  account  and  visit  upon  him  appropriate 
punishment.  Cicero  charges  the  disciples  of  Epicurus 
with  cashiering  the  heroic  virtues  of  Greece;  they 
were  content  with  the  ease  of  aesthetic  indifference; 
the  word  Honor  had  dropped  from  their  vocabulary. 
But  does  honor  always  imply  the  vindication  of  per- 


PAX  CHRISTI  293 

sonal  rights,  the  safeguarding  of  personal  goods?  If 
it  does,  the  life  of  Jesus  is  pitiably  lacking.  Peace 
with  honor  could  have  been  secured  by  an  adroit  com- 
promise. He  could  have  agreed  to  retract  His  invec- 
tives against  a  decadent  church  and  accept  the  tem- 
poral headship  of  its  rulers.  Men  and  nations  have 
adopted  such  articles  of  agreement,  and  history  has 
applauded  their  course.  Did  Jesus  seek  so  simple  an 
issue?  John  the  Baptist  fell  in  with  it,  and  he  was 
only  beguiled  from  his  policy  of  live-and-let-live  by  the 
cunning  of  an  insatiate  royal  vanity.  To  the  man  of 
Nazareth  peace  with  honor  represented  a  mere  lull  in 
the  campaign  against  wrong;  it  might  be  a  "truce  of 
God  "  ;  but  a  truce  is  a  breathing  spell  preliminary  to 
the  resumption  of  hostilities  on  a  more  massive  scale. 
Perhaps  we  may  change  the  slogan — not  peace  with 
honor  but  peace  with  justice  is  the  summary  of  our 
creed.  Certainly  we  are  nearer  now  to  the  purpose 
of  the  Lord.  His  soul  was  heavy  with  the  burdens  of 
a  people.  Political  servitude,  economic  pressure,  the 
pain  of  disease,  the  greed  and  cruelty  of  men  weighed 
upon  Him  as  upon  the  anguished  heart  of  a  Mazzini. 
He  could  not  rest  while  children  were  deprived  of  their 
birthright,  women  stripped  of  their  goods  by  due  proc- 
ess of  law,  and  hungry  men  went  without  the  common 
means  of  sustenance.  If  Christ  had  chosen.  He  could 
have  been  an  imposing  social  reformer,  He  might  even 
have  raised  an  insurrection  against  the  court  of 
Rome.  Then,  as  now,  the  quest  for  justice  invited 
eager  souls  to  a  desideratum,  whose  terms  have 
touched  the  lyre  of  many  a  bard  and  awakened  the 
hopes  of  sanguine  moralists.  But  one  difficulty  is  al- 
ways at  hand.  Jesus  knew  it.  Statesmen  the  world 
over  have  been  unable  to  escape  its  admonition.    The 


294  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

highest  moral  attribute  ascribed  to  God  by  Old  Testa- 
ment saints  becomes  inadequate  in  face  of  experience. 
Does  justice  abide?  Is  its  form  forever  fixed?  The 
most  generous  treatment  of  Greek  ethics  can  do  no 
more  than  to  make  it  an  ideal,  standing  at  the  end 
of  an  infinite  series  of  single  just  acts,  each  of  which 
is  conspicuous  for  what  it  lacks  rather  than  for  what 
it  has.  The  fact  is  that  justice  is  never  the  same; 
it  changes  with  soil  and  age.  It  cries  out  in  alarm 
when  a  fair  land  is  desecrated  by  the  hand  of  a  mur- 
derous enemy.  It  is  silent  before  the  ordinary  thrusts 
of  poverty.  If  yon  rushing  motor  sweeps  a  child  to  his 
death  the  law  takes  notice  in  the  course  of  time,  and 
tales  the  culprit  before  the  court — in  many  cases,  how- 
ever, only  to  exoneraate  him  on  the  ground  of  the 
child's  heedlessness.  But  what  sort  of  justice  is  exe- 
cuted for  the  multitudes  of  children  whose  lifeblood 
is  slowly  sapped,  whose  morals  are  cramped,  whose 
holy  affections  are  crushed  by  the  inveterate  lust  for 
gold  on  the  part  of  pitiless  employers?  Peace  with 
justice  is  a  noble  watchword ;  yet  in  the  world  of  finite 
susceptibilities  I  do  not  see  how  you  can  adjust  the 
wide  differences  of  opinion  to  the  certain  attainment 
of  right. 

If  justice  fails  as  the  fulcrum  of  peace  must  we  give 
up  the  case  in  despair?  We  should  be  tempted  to  do 
so,  were  we  confined  to  the  oracles  of  the  prophets. 
They  saw  the  futility  of  their  own  panaceas.  But 
divine  reason  is  not  exhausted.  It  will  set  a  last 
goal  at  whose  stake  the  coveted  prize  is  won.  Peace 
with  Love  is  the  symbol  of  the  new  covenant.  It  is 
emblazoned  on  the  wintry  sky  and  heralded  in  the 
angels'  song.  Peace  comes  to  earth  in  the  vehicle  of 
good  will.    There  is  no  peace  that  has  not  penetrated 


PAX  CHRISTI  295 

deep  into  the  mysteries  of  spiritual  companionship. 
The  peace  of  the  Christian  home  never  raises  the  ques- 
tion of  justice.  Each  new  problem  is  solved  on  the 
basis  of  common  interest,  which  is  love.  The  peace  of 
the  church — where  there  is  any — is  never  a  delicate 
balance  of  antithetical  forces;  it  is  a  mutual  under- 
standing of  duty  and  hope.  The  peace  of  neighbors 
is  in  many  cases  so  crude  and  remote  a  thing,  simply 
because  men  find  it  extremely  diflScult  to  get  the  other 
and  conflicting  point  of  view.  They  have  no  sympa- 
thies beyond  the  narrow  precincts  of  family  and 
business.  The  peace  of  science  is  sometimes  compel- 
ling; it  excites  the  remark  of  the  uninitiated  world, 
which  fails  to  perceive  her  unswerving  devotion  to 
the  principles  of  truth.  Shall  peace  between  nations 
be  built  on  a  foundation  less  secure?  What  can  make 
the  Japanese  people  the  sworn  friends  of  this  Repub- 
lic, except  a  resolute  endeavor  on  our  part,  seconded  by 
theirs,  to  examine  and  sympathetically  to  appraise 
every  private  ideal  and  public  aim?  The  spirit  of 
Christ's  peace  is  the  spirit  of  intelligent  regard,  at 
work  among  citizens,  at  work  among  states.  Love 
that  begets  concord  must  comprehend.  Instinctive  love 
does  not  heal,  it  divides.  I  suspect  that  Paul  would 
have  given  his  right  hand,  could  he  have  stricken  from 
the  record  the  story  of  his  disagreement  with  Barn- 
abas. He  did  not  understand  the  older  man's  insight 
into  the  vacillating  temper  of  John  Mark.  I  suspect, 
too,  that  if  France  and  Germany  could  see  into  one 
another's  heart,  forgetting  the  bitter  past  and  re- 
membering only  the  common  elements  of  culture  in 
art  and  science,  in  philosophy  and  statecraft,  even  in 
the  sacred  oflSces  of  religion,  where  they  differ  only  in 
form — they  could  begin  to  kindle  the  first  tiny  flame  of 


296  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

sympathy,  whose  increasing  glow  would  be  an  immeas- 
urable boon  to  the  civilization  of  the  world.  Peace, 
the  peace  of  Christ,  can  only  come  when  reserve  has 
given  place  to  acquaintance,  and  suspicion  to  the  open 
mind  of  respect. 

Ill 

The  final  query  is  thus  upon  us,  "How  shall  peace 
be  won?  "  It  is  clear  that  Jesus  definitely  rejects  the 
method  tried  by  men — "  Not  as  the  world  giveth." 
Peace  is  not  a  trophy  of  the  unsheathed  sword.  No 
question  of  right  and  wrong  has  found  its  safe  adjust- 
ment on  the  bloody  field.  It  may  be  thrown  into 
eclipse  for  a  moment;  the  circumstances  that  evoked 
it  may  be  obscured  in  the  smoke  of  battle  or  in  the 
delusive  haze  of  death,  but  eventually  it  will  awake 
again  to  consciousness,  to  new  and  more  poignant 
dread,  in  the  realization  of  how  much  men  have  suf- 
fered and  for  what  meager  returns.  High-strung  ora- 
tors and  adroit  special  pleaders  have  assured  us  that 
peace  bought  by  war  means  the  ordering  of  a  stronger 
manhood,  an  oflQcial  culture,  a  more  coherent  social 
fabric  and  a  higher  regard  for  law.  Unquestionably 
such  effects  follow.  Do  they  follow  alone  from  the 
fiery  discipline  of  war?  Is  there  nothing  in  the  indus- 
tries of  peace  that  works  out  the  same  character?  Is 
not  war  a  critic  rather  than  a  builder?  Does  it  not 
stalk  through  men's  streets  and  nature's  shady  lanes 
with  the  grim  intent  of  exposing  shams  and  teaching 
the  shallowness  of  ordinary  aims  by  a  subtle  stroke 
and  not  by  the  long  tutelage  of  evolution?  If  courage 
be  needed  can  you  find  its  solitary  expression  in  the 
arm  that  strikes?  If  individual  initiative  be  soothed 
into  repose  by  the  monotony  of  life,  shall  we  seek  its 


PAX  CHRISTI  297 

fresh  vigor  under  the  flash  of  guns  and  in  the  martial 
tread  of  a  million  soldiers?  If  you  would  induce  men 
to  put  away  petty  dissensions  and  unite  in  common 
effort,  must  you  wait  for  the  enemy  at  your  gates,  the 
Zeppelin  above  your  darkened  cities  or  the  unseen  foe 
beneath  your  vessel's  keel  ?  These  strictly  human  qual- 
ities are  not  fed  by  the  instincts  of  the  brute;  for  war 
is  the  resort  of  crude,  uncritical  impulse.  The  peace 
which  Eome  imposed  on  Europe  was  not  at  base  a 
triumph  of  arms.  War  shattered  the  flimsy  struc- 
tures of  primitive  society.  Law  entered  to  organize 
its  desperate  units  into  a  strong  and  self-acting  com- 
munity. The  principle  is  eternally  true — you  cannot 
control  the  mind  of  men  by  the  show  of  force.  Every 
League  to  Enforce  Peace  bears  the  seeds  of  its  own 
decay.  As  a  temporary  device  it  may  be  valuable,  but 
as  the  guardian  of  international  concord  it  is  doomed 
to  ignominious  failure. 

Nor  is  peace  determined  by  diplomacy.  Ever  since 
the  Congress  of  Berlin  portioned  out  the  sands  and 
jungles  of  helpless  Africa  to  the  earth-hungry  nations 
of  Europe,  and  appointed  spheres  of  influence  for 
their  activity,  conferences  for  the  settlement  of  dis- 
puted questions  have  been  the  order  of  the  day.  The 
Hague  Courts  went  so  far  as  to  submit  to  peaceful 
argument  the  manner  of  making  war.  Dramatic  sit- 
uations like  these  call  into  play  the  legal  erudition, 
the  historical  knowledge,  the  elements  of  prudence, 
but  above  all  a  nation's  skill  in  outwitting  its  oppo- 
nents in  the  clever  stating  of  its  particular  point  of 
view.  Every  diplomatic  pronouncement  is  a  balance 
of  strictly  opposed  interests  and  may  be  interpreted 
to  suit  the  needs  of  the  signatory  Power.  Peace  sus- 
pended by  so  slender  a  thread  is  a  Damoclean  sword; 


298  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

its  keen  blade  will  cut  to  pieces  the  man  or  body  of 
men  who  elect  to  disturb  its  equilibrium.  Peace  won 
by  strategy  is  a  patched  peace.  It  does  not  throb 
through  the  arteries  of  social  life  with  vitalizing  power. 
It  does  not  quench,  it  restrains  momentarily  the 
liquid  fires  of  resentment.  It  does  not  cure,  it  covers 
the  living  sore  with  a  membrane  of  temporary  reserve. 
The  success  of  Russia's  art  in  the  Peace  of  Portsmouth 
in  snatching  the  fruits  of  victory  from  her  financially 
exhausted  foe  will  never  be  forgotten  by  Japan.  Some 
day  the  hand  of  revenge  will  grip  the  saber;  some  day 
the  little  men  of  the  East  will  rise  in  the  fury  of  accum- 
ulated passion  to  erase  from  their  national  ensign  the 
stain  of  a  diplomatic  defeat.  It  is  vain  to  expect  per- 
petual concord  from  the  devices  of  a  human  court. 
The  world's  way  of  settling  differences  has  been  so 
often  discounted  by  the  event  that  we  need  not  stop 
to  debate  its  validity.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  Christ 
has  no  place  for  compromise  in  His  scheme  for  making 
peace.  You  must  either  be  against  Him  or  on  His  side. 
But  let  us  not  stop  with  a  joint  agreement,  let  us 
write  the  agreement  into  a  treaty.  Men  are  tempted 
to  evade  the  law  which  has  never  been  formally  enunci- 
ated; but  they  cannot  deny  the  truth  of  a  principle, 
when  once  it  has  found  solid  expression  in  the  nation's 
code.  The  American  Constitution  is  a  case  in  point. 
It  is  a  treaty  between  citizens.  It  is  a  confession  that 
a  group  of  intelligent  and  aggressive  men  are  free  to 
pursue  their  individual  occupations  with  safety  and 
success,  only  after  the  rights  of  intercourse  have  been 
carefully  determined.  Hence  that  important  paper 
is  the  instrument  of  peace,  the  anchor  of  our  liberties, 
the  guaranty  of  progress.  But  is  it  beyond  the  reach 
of  revision?    Can  its  authority  be  challenged?    For 


PAX  CHRISTI  299 

four  years  a  great  group  of  states  declined  to  accept  a 
particular  interpretation  of  its  terms.  They  were  forced 
by  arms  to  submit,  but  in  their  submission  they  estab- 
lished the  significant  principle  that  the  Constitution  is 
big  enough  to  care  for  the  interests  of  a  widely  diversi- 
fied national  character.  The  most  sacred  agreements 
have  been  bent  to  the  sway  of  passion  or  reason.  Treat- 
ies represent  a  temporary  need.  They  may  be  denounced 
to  serve  the  humanitarian  purposes  of  the  original 
makers.  They  are  at  times  arbitrarily  dissolved,  in 
order  to  steal  a  march  on  a  menacing  rival.  They 
embody  a  status  quo,  a  situation  made  possible  by  the 
bargain  of  certain  nations  and  terminated  by  one  or 
both  at  discretion.  If  peace  be  conditioned  upon  such 
a  fact,  it  is  easy  to  see  why  Jesus  would  reject  the 
terms  as  utterly  inadequate. 

What,  then,  can  suffice?  How  does  divine  peace  se- 
cure its  place  in  the  councils  of  earth?  I  answer,  the 
peace  of  Christ  comes  alone  by  growth.  It  is  not  by 
compact,  not  by  revolution,  but  by  the  slow  unfolding 
of  moral  excellence  that  peace  takes  its  seat  among 
men.  Scientific  fancy  has  led  our  conceits  backward 
through  the  mazes  of  geologic  history,  and  disclosed 
the  struggle  through  which  Life  has  passed  on  its 
way  to  a  complete  expression  in  the  reflective  mind 
of  man.  Students  of  civil  history  delight  to  point  out 
the  awakening  of  the  spirit  of  altruism  in  the  chan- 
cellories of  the  world,  which  occasional  lapses  into 
barbarism  cannot  wholly  quench.  It  is  harder  to 
make  war  now  than  ever  before.  In  view  of  the  rup- 
ture of  1914  many  readers  may  challenge  this  propo- 
sition. It  is  not  self-evident,  I  admit,  but  an  array  of 
arguments  stand  in  its  favor.  I  cite  but  two.  War 
does  not  break  now  so  readily  because  science  has  put 


300  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

in  the  hands  of  the  soldier  the  deadliest  weapons  he 
has  ever  wielded.  Greek  fire  and  the  gatling-gun  are 
primitive  as  compared  with  the  asphyxiating  gas  and 
42-centimeter  guns  of  present  struggle.  Again,  war 
can  no  longer  be  declared  without  rendering  to  the 
public  opinion  of  the  world  a  strict  account  for  the 
action.  Moral  sentiment  has  a  profounder  influence 
upon  national  enterprise  than  it  had  in  the  days  of 
Napoleon.  Red  Books,  White  Books,  Orange  Books, 
were  not  issued  a  hundred  years  ago.  The  conscience 
of  the  world  today  is  more  acute  and  demands  for 
every  act  of  war  a  summary  explanation.  Such  a  fact 
can  be  interpreted  in  one  way  alone — men  have  marched 
through  wars  to  a  real  love  of  peace.  Peace  is  not 
sought  in  dramatic  statement,  but  in  the  steady  cul- 
tivation of  a  brotherly  feeling. 

But  the  sentiment  for  civil  concord  is  part  of  a 
greater  movement.  The  spirit  of  man  is  being  changed. 
The  sacrificial  program  which  satisfied  Abraham 
would  be  horribly  repugnant  to  us.  Men  do  not  kill 
their  children  in  cold  blood  today,  though  men  break 
one  another's  hearts.  I  am  at  a  loss  to  discover  any 
difference.  In  some  respects  the  latter  form  of  injury 
is  more  painful,  because  so  subtle.  In  outward  form 
at  any  rate  the  change  is  for  the  better.  We  are  not 
concerned  at  the  moment  in  showing  that  men  have 
actually  secured  progress.  We  maintain  the  principle 
of  growth  as  the  sole  means  for  grasping  the  ideal 
elements  of  peace.  It  looks  as  though  Jesus  gave 
instant  proprietary  rights  to  His  disciples  when  it  is 
said,  "  He  breathed  on  them  and  said.  Receive  ye  the 
Holy  Ghost."    The  gift  is  sure,  the  appropriation  slow. 

You  ask  me  why  the  church  has  failed  to  get  His 
peace,  and  I  answer,  because  peace  comes  by  the  proc- 


PAX  CHRISTI  301 

ess  of  moral  development.  If  you  think  that  Christ 
will  present  a  superb  example  of  moral  firmness,  be- 
fore the  spirit  of  peace  has  had  time  to  work  on  the 
earth,  you  will  find  yourself  mistaken.  Life  is  double — 
it  appears  in  the  individual,  it  appears  in  the  species; 
but  it  is  always  life  struggling  for  wider  powers.  Life 
is  just  as  complete  in  the  lowest  organism  as  in  man, 
but  its  capabilities  are  for  the  most  part  sterilized  in 
the  one.  Peace  has  been  here  since  Jesus  lived.  It 
could  not  command  universal  acceptance  at  first.  It 
must  win  assent  by  slow  and  painful  stages.  Today 
peace  of  mind  is  a  sweeter,  more  gracious  property  than 
human  experience  has  ever  found  it.  The  world  has 
been  growing  into  a  character  in  which  peace  may 
be  fittingly  enshrined.  For  this  reason  we  are  bound 
to  say  that  peace,  not  war,  is  the  normal  order  of 
manhood.  The  savage  is  superseded  by  the  intelligent 
thinker,  the  warrior  by  the  apostle  of  culture. 


XVIII 
THE  CREED  OF  THE  GROSS 

John  14 :29.  "  And  now  I  have  told  you 
before  it  come  to  pass,  that  when  it  is  come 
to  pass  ye  m,ight  believe." 

THESE  words  are  heavy  with  meaning.  Their 
very  indefiniteness  lingers  with  impressive  ac- 
cents in  the  memory.  Something  unwanted 
threatens  to  shatter  the  peace  of  the  charmed  circle. 
Can  its  nature  be  divined?  The  manner  of  Jesus  in- 
timates that  the  event,  whatever  its  terms,  carries  with 
it  consequences  of  grave  import.  "  Before  it  come  to 
pass."  Two  events  only  in  His  historic  career  deserve 
a  prelude  so  solemn  as  this.  Is  He  preparing  their 
belief  in  natural  law  for  the  unexpected  return  of  His 
spirit  to  its  fleshly  home?  Certainly  an  exercise  of 
faith  beyond  the  common  were  required  for  that.  But 
such  faith  made  after  all  an  appeal  to  sense.  Thomas 
saw  his  Lord  and  believed. 

The  other  event  was  prior  to  the  resurrection  and 
its  necessary  hinge.  Faith  in  the  crucifixion  is  not  a 
matter  of  verifying  the  physical  fact.  The  evidence  of 
death  is  clear  from  the  scientific  data  which  John  col- 
lected and  preserved,  as  though  to  disarm  the  Docetic 
heresy  of  a  later  century.  Faith  deals  with  the  mean- 
ing of  the  fact,  the  values  which  truth  imposes  upon  it. 
Since  criticism,  except  in  extreme  cases  like  the 
theorizing  of  Arthur  Drews,  has  never  denied  the  ex- 

302 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  303 

press  fact  of  the  cross,  faith  has  no  need  to  pave  its 
way  by  a  citation  of  empirical  details.  Faith  ap- 
proaches the  facts  at  a  bound.  It  is  an  intuition,  not 
an  argument.  Faith  like  this  is  in  the  present,  it  is 
not  concerned  with  futurities.  Therefore,  it  is  the 
Lord's  duty  so  to  fashion  the  mental  attitude  of  his 
disciples  that  when  the  storm  breaks  they  will  not 
weather  its  momentary  fury,  but  catch  up  the  deter- 
mining principle  which  the  cross  reveals  for  the  sat- 
isfaction of  human  hopes.  Many  a  student  today  needs 
to  have  his  mind  calmed  by  a  prophetic  word,  ere  he 
sits  down  to  the  task  of  understanding  Calvary.  It 
evinces  Jesus'  insight  into  common  character  that  He 
guarantees  now  as  then  the  tenor  of  the  new  faith  by 
a  hint  as  to  the  inevitableness  of  its  object. 

The  cross  having  obtained  a  place  in  the  chronicles 
of  the  world,  what  meaning  shall  we  attach  to  its 
terms?  In  the  Scripture's  account  the  creed  of  the 
cross  is  salvation.    How  does  the  cross  save? 


The  cross  J)y  its  own  token  cannot  save.  It  is  one 
of  the  foibles  of  the  human  mind  to  ascribe  a  peculiar 
power  to  material  things.  Perhaps  this  pebble  was  in 
my  pocket  when  a  piece  of  good  fortune  came  to  me. 
Immediately  it  becomes  a  treasure,  and  all  kinds  of 
future  favors  await  its  touch.  Poetry  has  imbedded 
this  feeling  in  the  heart  of  her  fairest  creations.  Thus 
the  sword  of  King  Arthur  is  tempered  to  such  Dam- 
ascene strength  that  with  it  you  can  cleave  the  forest 
oak  to  its  pith,  and  neither  snap  nor  bend  it.  Religion 
has  employed  the  same  impulse  to  advantage.  The 
tree  beneath  which  Buddha  sat  possesses  a  vitality  so 


304  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

rich  and  abounding,  that  when  its  shoots  are  planted 
in  alien  soil  they  will  survive  the  blight  of  ages  and 
today  yield  refreshing  shade  to  the  weary  traveler. 
That  Christianity  by  the  sheer  beauty  of  its  teachings 
would  escape  a  similar  treatment  was  too  much  to 
expect.  Superstition,  sometimes  in  grossly  sensuous 
forms,  has  kept  pace  with  her  more  spiritual  attain- 
ments. Helena,  Empress  of  Byzantium,  is  reputed  to 
have  found  in  the  Holy  City  pieces  of  the  historic 
cross.  To  preserve  them  with  veneration  as  the  im- 
plements of  the  Lord's  suffering,  would  not  be  an  act 
out  of  keeping  with  the  temper  of  the  faith.  But 
human  credulity  does  not  stop  there.  It  conceived 
the  beams  as  charged  with  magical  power  and  capable 
of  exerting  an  influence  quite  different  from  the  mag- 
netic currents  of  nature.  Now  fancy  links  itself  at 
once  with  the  nearest  desire,  and  the  first  desire  is  the 
cure  of  pain.  It  follows  soon  that  the  cross  becomes 
the  symbol  of  medicinal  virtue.  Let  a  man  touch 
its  surface,  and  leprosy  was  removed,  lameness  cured, 
vagaries  of  mind  banished,  and  the  integrity  of  the 
body  renewed.  Scientific  education  and  the  critical 
exposure  of  so-called  "  cures  "  at  Lourdes  and  St.  Anne 
de  Beau  Pre  have  not  freed  certain  types  of  mind  from 
the  tyranny  of  the  foibles  they  love. 

It  is  not  our  business  to  trace  the  origin  of  religious 
superstition.  Psychology  can  do  that  with  a  bewil- 
dering variety  of  detail.  That  new  science  is  religion's 
consort  in  the  quest  for  truth.  What  we  seek  to  do  is 
to  crush  humanity's  regard  for  symbols,  when  they 
have  worked  their  way  insidiously  into  the  sanctuary 
of  truth.  We  hold  that  every  element  which  Christian 
affection  has  treasured  with  reverence  is  of  value  only 
in  so  far  as  we  are  able  to  read  in  it  the  evidences  of 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  305 

eternal  truth.  It  should  not  injure  the  faith  of  the 
humblest  saint  to  know  that  extreme  unction  poured 
upon  the  dying  brow  cannot  in  the  slightest  degree 
affect  the  future  destiny  of  the  soul.  It  is  the  sign,  not 
the  thing  signified.  By  the  same  token  the  waters  of 
baptism  are  wholly  devoid  of  spiritual  power.  To 
argue  that  by  sprinkling  a  few  drops  on  the  infant's 
head  you  can  implant  the  germs  of  right  living  is  to 
erect  sensuous  matter  into  the  guardian  of  the  mind. 
Nor  can  similar  claim  be  made  for  the  sacred  office  of 
the  Communion.  The  elements  are  physical  and  always 
remain  so.  Priestly  blessing  and  ecclesiastical  tra- 
dition are  helpless  to  change  their  form.  To  with- 
hold the  cup  from  the  laity  lest  in  its  service  the  blood 
of  Christ  should  be  accidentally  spilled  is  a  crude 
relapse  into  the  fetichism  of  primitive  society.  To 
think  of  the  real  body  of  Christ  as  co-existng  with  the 
material  loaf  is  a  tax  upon  the  patience  rather  than 
upon  the  credulity  of  the  worshipper.  In  fact,  any  at- 
tempt to  put  a  piece  of  earth  into  the  place  reserved 
for  spiritual  values  is  a  mockery  and  a  sham.  If  the 
cross  has  inherent  power  to  save,  it  did  not  need  the 
person  of  Jesus  to  magnetize  its  form.  The  cross  of 
the  penitent  thief  would  do  as  much.  If  the  cross  as 
such  be  essential  to  salvation,  then  you  have  confessed 
that  if  Jesus  had  died  by  the  Roman  sword  His  death 
would  have  been  robbed  of  its  beneficial  offices.  The 
hope  of  the  world  is  transferred  from  the  dying  Lord 
to  the  crude  instrument  by  which  He  met  His  death. 


II 

The  cross  as  the  instrument  of  law  cannot  save. 
The  Evangelists  are  in  no  doubt  as  to  what  the  Jews 


306  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

intended.  To  them  the  cross  of  Jesus  marked  the  end 
of  a  career  of  dishonor.  Let  us  admit  that  the  Mosaic 
law  was  a  compendium  of  the  civil  and  religious  life  of 
Israel.  Its  place  in  the  Canon  made  it  the  source  of 
authority  for  every  succeeding  book.  History  was  a 
dramatic  application  of  its  primary  precepts.  The 
sacred  poems  carried  its  terms  into  the  spiritual 
achievements  of  the  race.  Prophetic  elation  was  faulty 
and  vain,  except  as  it  embodied  the  ideals  of  the  tra- 
ditional religion.  Hence  the  scribe  became  the  re- 
sponsible teacher  of  the  nation.  To  him  was  granted 
the  right  to  construe  the  hard  sayings  of  the  law,  so  as 
to  suit  the  current  needs.  For  this  reason  Talmud  and 
Targum  assumed  in  the  course  of  time  an  importance 
far  beyond  their  intrinsic  worth.  The  spell  of  the  law 
passed  upon  them  much  in  the  way  that  the  authority 
of  Aquinas  infected  the  dogmas  of  the  medieval  church. 
To  criticize,  to  dispute,  to  defy  the  smallest  of  its 
injunctions  was  an  act  of  sin,  and  "  the  soul  that  sin- 
neth  it  shall  die."  It  is  this  sin  of  criticism  that  priest 
and  elder  charged  against  Jesus.  They  resented  His 
treatment  of  their  past.  What  right,  they  asked,  had 
this  Galilean  to  reorganize  the  basic  interests  of  the 
law  ?  Had  not  Moses  said,  "  An  eye  for  an  eye  and  a 
tooth  for  a  tooth "  ?  and  shall  this  modern  reader 
annul  a  fundamental  statute  by  the  counsel  of  non- 
resistance?  They  resented,  too,  His  undisguised  tone 
of  contempt  for  their  religious  practices.  Wise  and 
discriminating  jurists  had  specialized  the  statute 
governing  the  Sabbath  so  as  to  forbid  the  bearing  of 
burdens  on  the  Holy  Day.  Yet  Jesus  not  only  violated 
its  sanctity  by  a  dramatic  cure  but  dragged  His  benefi- 
ciary into  sin  by  commanding  him  to  carry  away  his 
bed.    They  resented  His  attitude  towards  their  vener- 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  307 

ated  shrine.  If  forty  years  were  consumed  in  erecting 
the  pinnacles  of  the  Temple,  could  the  unaided  genius 
of  an  amateur  reconstruct  them  within  three  days? 
They  despised  and  ridiculed  His  claims  to  Messianic 
virtue.  To  be  sure,  the  excited  populous  exclaimed, 
"When  Christ  cometh,  shall  he  do  more  miracles?" 
But  uninstructed  minds  are  swayed  by  the  emotions 
of  momentary  wonder.  The  real  denial  of  His  claims 
was  fixed  by  an  appeal  to  Scripture.  Jesus  could  not 
be  the  expected  Messiah,  for  the  facts  of  His  life  were 
wrong.  Bethlehem,  not  Nazareth,  is  the  birthplace  of 
the  nation's  Saviour.  With  bitter  words  and  angry 
gestures  they  resented  His  assumption  of  superhuman 
honors.  Before  the  high  priest's  court  He  destroyed 
with  a  word  the  first  article  in  the  Jewish  creed, 
"  Thou  shalt  have  no  other  gods  before  me,"  for  He 
made  Himself  equal  to  God.  Finally,  they  resented 
His  short  method  with  the  spiritual  authorities  of  the 
day.  He  handled  them  without  gloves,  exposed  their 
insincerities,  denounced  their  treatment  of  the  poor, 
held  up  to  ridicule  their  fringed  garments  and  sancti- 
monious airs,  pointed  the  finger  of  scorn  at  the  pag- 
eantry of  prayer,  and  adding  insult  to  injury,  justified 
the  broken  cry  of  the  Publican  over  against  the  sys- 
tematic self-complacence  of  the  Pharisee.  Since  teacher 
and  law  in  the  eyes  of  the  Jews  were  one  and  the 
same,  every  criticism  of  the  former  was  a  deliberate 
defiance  of  the  latter.  Jesus  was  undoubtedly  guilty. 
But  Jesus  did  not  stand  alone.  His  guilt  was  one 
of  solidarity.  In  His  sin  He  carried  with  Him  the  of- 
fense of  His  entire  generation.  "  This  people  is  ac- 
cursed, because  they  know  not  the  law."  In  the  secret 
queries  of  groping  faith  many  an  Israelite  was  just  as 
culpable  as  He.    John  the  Baptist  vocalized  their  re- 


i308  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

volt  in  his  impassioned  sermons  by  the  Jordan.  The 
religious  leaders  were  aware  of  the  volcanic  pit  yawn- 
ing before  them.  They  were  bound  hand  and  foot  in 
political  matters  by  the  decree  of  Rome.  They  were 
fighting  now  to  retain  their  hold  on  the  spiritual  habits 
of  Judea.  Time  had  made  them,  they  felt,  the  chosen 
depositories  of  religion.  To  them  as  infallibly  as  to 
the  papal  throne  had  been  committed  the  oracles  of 
revelation.  If  they  could  not  maintain  the  sanctity  of 
law,  who  could?  If  vengeance  fell  not  on  the  violators 
of  its  sacred  precepts,  how  could  the  faith  which  meant 
safety  to  the  race  ever  be  preserved  from  extinction? 

Therefore,  animated  by  zeal  for  the  law  and  a  desire 
to  take  personal  revenge,  they  determined  to  make  an 
example.  Religion  utters  its  sharpest  protests  when 
it  requires  one  man,  a  self-confessed  leader,  to  pay 
the  penalty  for  public  skepticism.  "  It  is  expedient," 
exclaims  the  pious  Caiaphas,  "  that  one  should  die  for 
the  people."  That  is  to  say,  the  majesty  of  the  law 
does  not  exact  a  wholesale  slaughter  of  offenders.  In 
that  way  you  might  deprive  innocent  men  of  their  lives. 
Here  and  there  you  might  kill  some  who  could  be  re- 
stored to  loyalty  by  intimidation  or  an  appeal  to  self- 
interest.  Law  is  symbolic  in  its  intent  and  its  sanc- 
tions. Just  as  social  sovereignty  may  be  construed 
as  reposing  in  responsible  rulers,  so  offenses  against 
its  will  may  be  gathered  up  and  laid  upon  the  shoulders 
of  a  single  eminent  transgressor.  The  principle  of 
representation  is  to  be  invoked  to  cover  the  insur- 
rectionary attitude  of  the  people  towards  their  reli- 
gious governors. 

So  much  for  the  historic  opinion  of  the  Sanhedrin. 
We  could  dismiss  the  situaton  as  a  case  of  professional 
pique  or  misjudged  zeal,  if  the  principle  of  symbolic 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  309 

punishment  had  not  been  seized  upon  by  a  master- 
mind of  the  seventeenth  century  to  explain  the  mean- 
ing of  the  cross.  Hugo  Grotius  was  a  man  of  remark- 
able legal  talents.  His  genius  was  analytic,  and  at 
the  same  time  constructive.  It  was  he  who  framed 
the  first  conceits  of  international  jurisprudence.  He 
argued  that  if  a  legal  code  based  on  moral  right  could 
guide  the  conduct  of  the  community,  it  is  absurd  not 
to  apply  the  same*  principles  to  the  exchange  of  ideas 
as  between  states.  Then  under  the  influence  of  his 
theological  studies  he  swept  over  the  barriers  that 
separate  the  finite  and  Infinite,  and  organized  a  social 
relationship  between  God  and  man.  Here  as  in  the 
civil  state  if  law  be  violated  some  device  must  be  found 
for  its  vindication.  The  value  of  punishment  lies  often 
in  the  warning  it  gives  to  offenders.  It  tells  men  what 
to  expect  if  certain  crimes  are  committed.  But  the 
state  itself  will  be  in  serious  danger  of  destruction,  if 
all  who  are  culpable  under  its  law  should  be  held  in 
duress.  It  is  therefore  advisable  to  vindicate  the  maj- 
esty of  justice  by  laying  the  burden  upon  a  single  in- 
dividual. Let  us  choose  not  a  commonplace  misde- 
meanant such  as  Barabbas  but  the  Lord  of  Glory  Him- 
self, who  voluntarily  assumes  the  burden.  He  knows 
no  sin  in  His  own  person,  but  in  His  own  person  can 
include  the  woes  of  humanity,  inasmuch  as  He  is  by 
distinction  the  First  Man;  and  bearing  the  effects  of 
their  sin  He  can  prove  the  inexorableness  of  law  in 
the  divine  order  of  the  world. 

Such  is  the  argument.  Can  we  accept  it?  Common 
sense  sees  at  least  three  fatal  implications.  First, 
Jesus  is  without  share  in  the  sins  of  humanity; 
secondly,  before  the  law  no  man  can  assume  the  guilt 
of  another;   thirdly,   stern  punishment  in  one  case 


310  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

does  not  actually  warn  off  future  transgressions  in  the 
same  field.  Let  me  give  an  example.  In  1905  the 
Spanish  government  apprehended  a  group  of  reputed 
anarchists  who  were  accused  of  plotting  against  the 
state.  They  were  tried  and  found  guilty.  It  was 
thought  that  the  execution  of  so  large  a  group  might 
create  a  feeling  dangerous  to  the  security  of  the  throne. 
Accordingly  they  determined  to  make  an  example  by 
choosing  for  death  its  most  distinguished  member,  Pro- 
fessor Ferrer  of  the  University  of  Madrid.  The  day  of 
execution  arrived.  Upon  the  Plaza  the  undaunted 
leader  was  brought  out  to  suffer  for  his  kind.  Before 
him  stood  the  six  guardsmen  detailed  to  fire  the  fatal 
shot.  The  signal  was  given,  the  report  heard,  and 
the  body  pierced  by  the  unerring  bullets  fell  lifeless 
upon  the  pavement.  Justice  in  Spain  is  avenged  and 
the  threatened  anarchy  removed. 

Is  the  conclusion  valid?  Does  death  at  the  exe- 
cutioner's hand  reaffirm  the  sanctity  of  law?  Can 
the  moral  order  of  the  world  be  reorganized  and 
kindled  to  new  vigor  by  the  sacrifice  of  any,  even  its 
best?  Do  we  not  import  a  crude  and  unspiritual  view 
of  law  into  the  purposes  of  God,  when  we  ascribe  a 
"governmental"  oflBce  to  the  atonement  of  Christ? 
Questions  such  as  these  brush  away  the  spell  which  in- 
genious dialectics  have  spun  about  the  Grotian  theory. 
They  reveal  the  artificial  character  of  the  scheme. 
It  may  suffice  for  a  momentary  need  in  harassed 
states,  but  it  does  not  provide  the  elements  of  truth 
which  will  explain  the  beauty  and  the  serene  hopeful- 
ness of  Jesus'  life  or  the  unflinching  firmness  of  His 
death. 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  311 

III 

The  cross  as  an  example  of  fidelity  cannot  save. 
It  is  an  accepted  fact  that  loyalty  as  a  spiritual  prin- 
ciple finds  its  expression  in  every  human  relation. 
Family,  race,  nation,  are  common  fields  for  the  play 
of  its  vigorous  forces.  Study  the  simple  forms  of  asso- 
ciation in  the  early  clan  and  compare  them  with  the 
bewildering  coordinations  of  executive  government  in 
a  Republic.  What  can  explain  the  subtle  cohesion  of 
the  group?  The  answer  is  found  in  the  fact  we  are 
discussing.  The  obedience  of  a  tribe  to  its  chief,  the 
service  of  a  class  to  its  masters,  the  respect  of  subjects 
for  the  majesty  of  the  king,  the  response  of  democratic 
societies  to  the  sense  of  law — these  are  historic  samples 
of  loyal  feeling.  Yonder  on  the  battlefield  you  will 
find  a  million  breathing  units  distinct  in  type  of  mind 
and  in  personal  experience,  but  deliberately  sensible 
of  one  patriotic  impulse.  Men  face  the  shrieking 
shrapnel,  huddle  for  days  in  water-soaked  trenches, 
pierce  the  ominous  splendor  of  the  clouds,  submerge 
themselves  beneath  menacing  waves,  all  for  the  pur- 
pose of  bodying  forth  the  same  loyal  sentiment.  Nor 
is  the  sacrifice  of  war  alone  on  the  field  of  carnage.  In 
hospitals  and  tents  women  are  standing  by  maimed 
and  bleeding  bodies,  administering  the  restorative 
draught,  applying  the  healing  bandage;  and  far  away 
in  obscure  village  or  town  mothers  and  sweethearts 
with  quiverifig  anxiety  await  the  sound  of  feet  which 
shall  never  again  return.  They  murmur  not,  nor 
repine.  For  the  safety  of  the  country,  the  land  of 
birth  and  honor,  they  will  yield  all  they  have,  all  they 
hold  dearest.  Loyalty  is  inextinguishable  in  the  breast 
of  humanity.    Loyalty  is  the  key  to  action. 


312  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

Yet  granted  the  virtue  of  the  principle  as  an  indi- 
vidual impulse,  laaj  we  venture  to  affirm  it  as  a  uni- 
versal social  force?  I  do  not  forget  that  the  Spartan 
youth  was  goaded  to  courage  by  the  sight  of  his  in- 
trepid comrade.  Nor  can  I  overlook  the  pedagogic 
fact,  used  with  notable  results  by  the  teachers  of  the 
Jesuit  order,  that  emulation  is  an  effective  measure 
for  driving  the  indifferent  scholar  to  his  task.  I  am 
not  unmindful  of  historic  scenes  when  the  passion  of 
Stephen  eats  its  way  into  the  bigoted  conscience 
of  Saul,  when  Ignatius  turns  from  the  flaming  pyre  of 
Polycarp's  martyrdom,  a  determined  advocate  of 
Gospel  truth.  Still,  I  ask,  can  fidelity  to  principle  give 
pledge  of  a  sure  return  in  the  character  and  number  of 
its  followers?  Socrates  bows  to  the  will  of  the  Athe- 
nian Senate  and  amid  the  shadows  of  departing  day, 
environed  by  his  weeping  friends,  drinks  the  cup  of 
hemlock  rather  than  deny  the  intellectual  liberty  which 
opens  man's  path  to  the  attainment  of  truth.  Did 
many  at  once  leave  home  and  business  to  seek  the  same 
heroic  death  as  his?  Is  it  not  engrossed  on  the  scroll 
of  history  that  the  man  of  reform  is  the  most  solitary 
citizen  in  the  world?  Is  it  not  the  fear  of  social 
ostracism  or  a  native  conservatism  clinging  to  ancient 
idols  or  commonplace  stupidity  which  cannot  enter- 
tain the  idea  of  perfected  justice  in  city  and  nation, 
that  leaves  the  man  of  vision  without  a  comrade  in 
his  fearless  challenge  of  iniquity?  Under  certain 
circumstances  loyalty  issues  her  call  in  vain. 

But  you  turn  about  and  say,  The  witness  of  the  cross 
was  different  from  this.  Jesus  died,  because  He  stood 
for  a  reorganization  of  social  habits  upon  the  basis  of 
honesty.  I  do  not  hesitate  to  subscribe  to  the  view  that 
He  was  a  stern  and  insistent  critic  of  the  irregularities 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  313 

of  social  life.  He  was  far  more  radical  than  John  the 
Baptist,  who  merely  advised  the  correction  of  abuses. 
Jesus  demanded  a  new  scheme  of  economics  with  which 
it  would  be  impossible  for  a  man  to  take  advantage  of 
his  neighbor.  To  preach  the  doctrine  He  had  to  fly  in 
the  face  of  hostile  vested  interests.  He  had  no  fear 
but  He  paid  for  His  zeal  by  the  cross.  Did  His  fellow- 
countrymen  rally  to  the  support  of  the  new  creed? 
A  beggarly  number — 120 — supported  the  cause  in  Jeru- 
salem, and  few  if  any  of  them  came  from  the  Blue 
Book  of  the  city.  Five  hundred  others  sequestered 
among  the  hills  of  Galilee  testified  silently  to  a 
loyalty  they  dared  not  confess.  The  fate  of  Jesus  is 
the  familiar  lot  of  moral  crusaders.  You  must  strike 
a  higher  note  than  mere  example,  if  you  expect  the 
world  to  bate  its  breath  and  listen.  Did  Italy  listen 
when  Savonarola  hurled  his  anathemas  against  the 
corruption  of  the  Florentine  city?  If  you  pit  the 
Medici  against  the  monk  which  would  eventually  tri- 
umph ?  The  blazing  stake  and  the  ashes  of  the  martyr 
are  history's  answer  to  the  query.  A  much  more  subtle 
answer  was  the  unemancipated  mind  of  the  Italian 
people,  which  might  have  fared  forth  to  talented  deeds, 
rivaling  the  worth  of  Petrarch  and  Dante,  but  which 
deliberately  shut  its  gates  to  honor  and  progress,  till 
Mazzini,  Cavour,  and  Garibaldi  spoke.  An  ethical  pro- 
gram cannot  elicit  the  enthusiastic  suffrages  of  man- 
kind. 

The  argument  swings  in  another  direction.  Let  us 
grant  that  dramatic  loyalty  is  not  an  invincible  lure 
and  may  fail  at  the  cross  as  well  as  by  the  cup  of 
hemlock.  Nevertheless,  we  have  not  exhausted  the 
specifications  of  the  case.  It  is  agreed  that  the  Suf- 
ferer has  connections  which  differentiate  Him  from  the 


314.  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

mass  of  men.  He  is  more  than  human,  He  is  divine, 
in  what  sense  need  not  here  be  defined.  If  He  be 
divine  His  death  carries  with  it  an  organic  power  in- 
accessible to  the  finest  act  of  human  devotion.  It  be- 
longs to  the  class  of  facts  summed  up  in 

"The  one  far  off  divine  event 
To  which  the  whole  creation  moves,'* 

and  for  which  failure  is  in  the  nature  of  the  case  im- 
possible. Movements  issuing  from  the  skill  and  inter- 
ests of  men  are  doomed  to  extinction,  as  witness 
schools  of  philosophy  and  systems  of  government.  But 
the  moral  energy  of  the  cross  cannot  evaporate  in  the 
haze  of  an  impersonal  drama.  If  Jesus  died  as  the 
organ  of  divine  power  He  will  compel  attention.  We 
shall  follow  instinctively  in  His  train,  because  we  share 
the  coercion  of  supernatural  purpose,  of  which  the 
death  of  Christ  is  one  necessary  link.  We  are  drawn 
to  the  cross  as  irresistibly  as  the  needle  to  the  pole. 
The  essence  of  abstract  choice  is  lost.  To  look  at 
Him  who  dies  triumphantly  out  of  fidelity  to  principle 
is  to  conceive  the  spirit  of  emulation.  The  hypo- 
thetical example  becomes  an  insidious  drive  to  action. 
The  rod  of  love  has  been  converted  into  the  scepter 
of  spiritual  grace. 

From  this  conclusion  the  entire  body  of  revelation 
dissents.  Men  are  not  coerced  by  the  majesty  of  an 
event.  They  may  tremble  before  its  splendors  and  be 
moved  to  action  by  its  dramatic  vividness.  But  sal- 
vation is  not  in  emotion ;  nor  can  a  human  soul  suffer 
a  profound  change  of  nature,  as  water  breaks  up  into 
its  analytic  parts  by  the  introduction  of  an  electric 
current.  To  look  at  the  cross  and  feel  your  cowardly 
temper  suddenly  vaporize  and  in  its  place  the  bold 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  315 

confidence  of  Jesus  appear,  and  then  to  hold  that 
saving  grace  can  be  grasped  in  that  way  and  in  none 
other,  is  to  award  the  rights  of  Christian  discipleship 
to  Bishop  Cranmer  only  after  he  had  recanted  his  Re- 
cantation, and  thrust  the  hand  that  wrote  it  into  the 
consuming  fire.  In  a  word,  salvation  reaches  its  zenith 
of  perfection  amid  the  heroics  of  a  martyr's  death.  If 
this  be  true  how  shall  we  account  for  the  quiet  saints, 
who  have  shrunk  from  pain  and  suffering,  yet  have 
possessed  an  invincible  assurance  of  personal  ac- 
ceptance? 

IV 

The  cross  dripping  with  the  hlood  of  sacrifice  saves. 
The  creed  of  Calvary  is  definitely  announced  in  this 
word.  The  language  of  the  Sermon  and  above  all 
the  symbols  of  the  Sacrament  warn  us  that  the  fore- 
going sentiments  about  His  death,  while  not  without 
a  measure  of  truth,  do  not  contain  the  whole  truth. 
One  point  is  lacking.  To  supply  it  we  must  go  to 
the  ancient  economy.  The  cross  and  the  altar  record 
the  same  spiritual  facts.  The  parallel  is  not  an  ingen- 
ious fancy  of  the  men  of  the  Dispersion;  it  is  organic 
to  the  Gospel.  Two  truths  are  inscribed  on  each,  sin 
and  sacrifice,  and  these  two  truths  speak  out  in  every 
drop  of  blood  that  falls  from  the  riven  side. 

The  death  of  Jesus  gives  for  the  first  time  a  com- 
plete understanding  of  sin.  How  else  shall  a  man 
entertain  a  convincing  sense  of  the  seriousness  of  his- 
transgression?  Two  ways  are  usually  suggested.  We 
repair  to  general  formulas  sprung  from  the  common 
conscience  of  the  race.  The  Chaldean  sagas  proclaim 
in  sententious  phrase  that  man  has  lost  his  innocence 
and  is  unfit  to  enter  the  garden  of  the  gods.    Man  is  a 


316  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

sinner.  The  dramatic  poets  of  Greece  ascribe  every 
catastrophe — storm,  earthquake,  slaughter,  sudden  and 
untraced  death — to  the  summary  vengeance  of  heaven. 
Seneca,  heir  to  a  more  scientific  scheme  of  the  world, 
carries  human  misery  back  to  the  deliberate  neglect  of 
well-established  law,  which  if  a  man  should  carefully 
guard,  he  could  pursue  an  even  and  happy  course  to 
the  end.  The  recognition  of  sin  has  become  a  canon  of 
good  breeding,  the  orthodox  explanation  of  social  in- 
equalities, and  sometimes  a  fair  excuse  for  moral  in- 
action. But  does  the  recitation  of  a  formula  force  the 
sense  of  sin  home  upon  my  conscience?  If  I  inspect 
the  penitentiary,  the'  asylum,  the  institute  for  the 
feeble-minded,  and  even  the  hospital,  I  may  be  im- 
pressed with  the  patent  effects  of  sin;  but  do  I  find  a 
copy  of  my  own  experience  there?  If  I  inquire  into 
the  system  of  law  and  order,  the  statutes  on  the  books, 
the  decisions  of  the  court,  I  shall  certainly  be  over- 
taken with  a  clamorous  repetition  of  the  formula,  but 
my  personal  relation  to  its  terms  escapes  me  utterly. 
Sin  is  not  taught  by  the  rehearsal  of  a  generalized 
truth. 

The  next  method  proposed  for  producing  the  sense 
of  sin  is  to  see  it  flaming  in  the  conviction  of  another. 
Guilt,  we  affirm,  is  personal.  It  cannot  be  concealed 
in  the  brilliant  phrase  of  an  epigram.  It  belongs  to 
the  fabric  of  personality.  Our  human  life  is  cast  in 
one  mould.  By  the  universal  currents  of  sympathy  we 
can  enter  the  sanctuary  of  another  man's  woes,  and 
admit  him  to  a  share  of  our  own.  If  I  steal  into  the 
garden  at  Milan  and  peer  in  the  face  of  Augustine  as 
he  struggles  with  the  weight  of  sin,  shall  I  immediately 
feel  the  burden  of  my  own  guilt — a  heart  dull  and  sod- 
den, a  soul  content  with  earthly  ambitions,  a  body  per- 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  317 

haps  throbbing  with  the  unsated  yearnings  of  sense? 
Let  us  note  the  difiference  between  dramatic  sympathy 
and  personal  conviction.  The  collapse  of  many  a  re- 
ligious revival  rests  here.  The  feeling  which  you 
took  to  be  a  violent  shudder  in  the  presence  of  sin  is 
only  the  natural  impulse  whch  makes  your  neighbor's 
agony  a  momentary  monitor  of  your  soul.  If  you  sup- 
pose you  have  undergone  spiritual  change,  because 
tears  stood  in  the  eye  and  a  quiver  thrilled  through 
the  frame,  in  all  probability  you  will  wake  up  the  next 
morning  to  a  brutal  disillusionment.  Conviction  of 
sin  does  not  come  in  that  fashion.  I  have  no  quarrel 
with  the  impulse  of  sympathy.  Under  fair  conditions 
it  may  become  an  instrument  for  the  true  appreciation 
of  sin.  But  I  dispute  the  right  of  preacher  or  moralist 
to  confuse  the  two  psychological  acts,  and  add  the 
gravity  of  the  one  to  the  purely  formal  expression  of 
the  other.  You  can  no  more  excite  in  yourself  anguish 
for  sin  by  looking  at  Augustine,  than  you  can  analyze 
the  elements  of  pain  by  standing  at  the  side  of  a  strong 
man  whose  body  is  writhing  with  the  convulsions  of  a 
deadly  disease.  Many  a  mother  has  sat  by  the  bed  of 
her  suffering  child  and  fancied  her  own  breast  vibrat- 
ing with  kindred  pain.  Sympathy  has  done  its  work, 
but  pain,  real  organic  pain,  can  never  be  understood 
till  we  have  lain  down  under  the  hand  of  accident  or 
disease,  and  heard  for  ourselves  nature's  bitter  pro- 
test against  her  broken  laws.  If  by  some  strange 
fellowship  St.  Francis  could  reproduce  the  wounds  of 
Christ  in  his  flesh,  then  you  may  repeat  the  conviction 
of  sin  by  dwelling  upon  the  experience  of  your  neigh- 
bor. But  science  has  steadily  discouraged  the  pursuit 
of  the  mystic's  method. 
How  then  shall  we  gain  a  private  view  of  sin  if  gen- 


318  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

eralization  and  testimony  fail?  The  query  is  breathed 
by  the  fainting  heart  of  the  world.  Today,  as  in  the 
time  of  David,  men  are  asking.  Where  shall  rest  be 
found?  Rest?  What  kind  of  rest?  Not  rest  of  body, 
for  one  may  fall  on  sleep  and  forget  his  tire;  not  rest 
from  pain,  for  the  "  way  "  is  always  open  as  the  Stoics 
taught;  not  rest  from  the  vicissitudes  of  intellectual 
doubt,  for  here  and  there  a  Lao-tse,  a  Nietsche,  bravely 
assures  us  that  he  has  rightly  "  divided  "  the  truth  of 
the  world.  Rest  from  what?  Manifestly  from  the 
deepest  agony  that  human  life  knows,  when  alone  with 
self  and  aface  with  the  evidence  of  concrete  sin  we 
ask  how  conscience  can  be  curbed  and  the  bitterness 
of  soul  dulled. 

It  is  this  query  which  Christianity  answers  by  point- 
ing to  the  cross.  There  the  sin  of  the  world  is  printed 
and  there  the  gravity  of  sin  for  the  first  time  is  under- 
stood. There  as  in  so  many  other  vital  matters  the 
value  of  one  fact  is  determined  by  its  relation  to  an- 
other. In  order  to  effect  the  obliteration  of  sin  Jesus 
the  Son  of  God  suffered  death.  The  principle  of  sac- 
rifice by  death  is  not  unknown  in  the  annals  of  science. 
The  stalwart  oak  battling  with  the  strength  of  a  thou- 
sand tempests  cannot  escape  from  its  rudimentary  shell, 
except  as  the  acorn  is  hidden  in  the  ground  and  given 
over  to  die.  Natural  law,  God's  law,  is  supreme  as  well 
in  the  evolution  of  society.  The  proud  monuments  of 
civil  liberty  are  built  upon  the  sacrifice  of  uncounted 
generations.  Imperial  manhood  has  passed  through 
blood  and  death  to  its  current  honor.  Fearless  souls 
guided  with  inspired  thought  leap  not  to  their  thrones 
by  sudden  desire,  but 

"men  may  rise  on  stepping  stones 
Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 


THE  CREED  OF  THE  CROSS  319 

The  principle  of  sacrifice  is  not  the  edict  of  mysti- 
cism. It  was  not  fashioned  by  the  uncritical  taste  of 
early  mythology,  then  stripped  of  its  poetic  form  and 
woven  into  the  seams  of  a  spiritual  religion.  Sacri- 
fice is  the  identification  of  Godhead  with  humanity's 
self.  Since  sin  is  by  natural  law  bound  up  with  the 
issues  of  death  it  was  necessary  that  divine  sacrifice 
should  not  decline  the  bitterest  death  of  all.  Jesus  if 
He  died  must  be  impaled  upon  the  cross,  which  under 
every  sun  has  been  the  dark  consort  of  guilt  and 
shame.  Sacrifice  such  as  this  seemed  to  the  secular 
sense  of  men  a  proof  of  defeat.  "  He  saved  others," 
they  jeer,  "  himself  he  cannot  save."  From  the  tor- 
ments of  fever  and  the  black  pall  of  death  He  had  in- 
deed rescued  many,  but  in  the  last  great  effort  of  aton- 
ing service  Jesus  could  not  refuse  the  cross.  In  the 
temple  of  manhood  sacrifice  has  chiseled  memorials  of 
enduring  worth — Socrates,  Dante,  Milton,  Lincoln.  It 
has  won  its  supreme  triumphs  in  the  economy  of  grace, 
for  here  it  has  wrested  a  world  from  the  tenacious  em- 
brace of  spiritual  doom. 

Like  the  smoking  altar  whose  promise  it  fulfilled  the 
Cross  becomes  a  challenge  to  unappeased  conscience. 
Formal  definition,  legal  precept,  sympathetic  reaction 
to  another's  penitence  have  failed  to  impart  a  convinc- 
ing sense  of  sin.  These  are  dramatic  units  apart  from 
the  common  experience  of  life.  But  when  Christ  calls 
with  His  gaping  wounds,  as  through  the  pictured  can- 
vas He  called  to  Zinzendorf,  "  This  I  did  for  thee, 
what  hast  thou  done  for  me?  " — the  voice  of  sacrifice  is 
vibrant  both  with  entreaty  and  command.  The  sin  of 
man,  the  sin  of  my  soul,  is  now  for  the  first  time  a 
recognized  fact.  Calvary  is  not  the  seat  of  prescrip- 
tive judgment,  Calvary  is  not  the  goad  to  loyal  emu- 


320  JOHN  FOURTEEN 

lation.  Law  and  example  are  but  incidents  in  its 
appeal.  The  creed  of  Calvary  is  written  in  Jesus' 
sacrifice  for  sin.  By  this  creed  the  church  has  for 
many  ages  shaped  her  program  and  practice.  She  has 
conquered  ignorance  by  giving  plentifully  of  her  benev- 
olent tuition;  she  has  overwhelmed  vice  by  the  un- 
stained virtue  of  her  sons;  she  has  pierced  the  ram- 
parts of  pagan  despair  by  an  unreckoned  expenditure 
of  her  best  blood  and  treasure.  She  knows  what  it 
means  to  sacrifice  for  another.  Hence  she  cannot  be 
unappreciative  of  her  Lord's  desire  to  forestall  by  the 
quiet  reassurance  of  faith  the  disciple's  cry  of  terror 
at  His  tragic  withdrawal  from  the  world.  If  Jesus 
bears  in  His  body  the  eflScacious  prints  of  atonement, 
no  less  has  the  church  written  upon  her  heart  the  un- 
faltering syllables  of  sacrificial  service.  Through  storm 
and  sunshine,  pain  and  death  her  sons  have  nobly  met 
the  royal  challenge — 

Greater  love  hath  no  man  than  this, 
That  a  man  lay  down  his  life  for  his  friends. 


BS2615.D917 

John  fourteen,  the  greatest  chapter  of 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary-Speer  Library 


1    1012  00013  6871 


